Ina Chadwick invokes her father through the dance of memory.
___
Nathan is a formal name
A man named Nathan should wear a suit and tie,
but he sat
in his ribbed undershirt
reading the “Times
ignoring the ballerina’s leaps
across the living room,
shooing her off his lap.
Nathan is a biblical name.
A man named Nathan should have the time
to lay a soft hand on a ballerina’s hair
when she dips before him
waving in the air,
her small head
turning like a star,
but he stood
before the rifle rack,
loaded his guns and
hunted woodchucks
in the yard.
This morning
there are creases near my eyes
and arabesques would leave me breathless
for a day,
Nathan, The Father, cut in stone,
do you see me spinning cartwheels on your grave?
Editor’s Note: This poem first appeared in 1976 in a literary magazine, Gravida, funded by the Coordinating Council of Literary Magazines and The New York State Council on the Arts, under the name Ina Chadwick Wilde.
Photo—Gerald Pereira/Flickr