Finally, Home

Note: Now, at the commencement of my birth month and the approach of my natal day anniversary, marking the penultimate year of my seventh decade of life in this world, thoughts of the meaning of mortality arise. This is one…

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My childhood household wasn’t a happy place or safe space. Not for me.

Elder dreams shattered, none discarded, all hoarded, as spectral company, cluttered ev’ry nook and cranny.

And the fragmented hopes of manifold orisons shouted aloft and, when unanswered (unheard?), fell back to earth, crashing, as littering shards covering the floor.

Thus, the test, nay, the impossibility ‘twas to tread without being cut by his circadian critique; he who yearned to relive, to revive his life through me.

I was not mine own; not one to be nurtured to become his self (whoever that was or could be or would be), but only his should-be-servant to his Svengali.

In time, after an over-the-years long, hard time of inward journey and outward discovery, by God’s grace, I made peace with the price of the sacrifice I had made. The sacrifice I was.

And, by God’s grace, I made peace with his history of denial, familial and societal. And from the seed of that awareness came the fruit of forgiveness.

Now, in mine aging, the lines of time etching once smooth flesh, when I look at my reflection, I see, day by day, more and more his face. And, no longer turning away, wanly, I smile.

© 2021 PRA