issue 26 > poetry > turco

Today I have reached the year my father was
when he died — I was thirty-four, old enough,

one would think, to handle it, old enough
to lose the man I loved more than myself. I was,

I guess, excepting for the dreams. He was
no one I could live up to — I was not big enough

to fill his shoes, nor was I good enough
to outlive the likes of him. I was

not able to believe the things he was
dedicated to: there were not souls enough

for both of us to save. It was enough
for me to save my own, I thought. Or was

it? I could not believe in souls. What was
a soul? The anima in us? I’d had enough

of preachment to last a thousand years. Enough!
My father was belied by the world. I was

unable to understand how good he was
or could be in the face of hell enough

for all the world forever, hell enough
to last any man old as he was.