When My Father Died Copyright © Sally Warrell 4 July 2009

“He’s already cold,”
My mother said
“He was warm.”
I bent and kissed his cooling brow
Still warm to me, after the starry chill
Of the December night
I shrugged off with my coat
Still warm, like cooling bread

I saw that his eyes,
Those eyes that had followed me
Only hours before
Now followed nothing
But were otherwise the same

I had met those quick brown eyes
And I had known
That whatever was left unsaid
Would never now be said

I was saying goodbye
And so I had just said
I love you, not knowing if he would
Need such information
Not knowing if he heard me

Or knew anything
Beyond the pain of the infection
That would stop his heart

And so I said goodbye again
Moments before they came
And scooped him up
Like a broken toy
In his striped boy blue pyjamas
And zipped him up in a black bag
Right over the head
And I wondered how he would breathe now
And for days I lay awake at night
Worrying that he would be cold
With no one to warm his bones
Not accepting that he was dead
And beyond any further hurt
Dead, dead, my father dead
Her husband, dead
No other word could fill our mouths
For days, as if we had to make it true
And still it astonished

This is what I remember