To My Father

Sometimes when I look up and see clouds drenched in molten gold, dripping with brilliant sunrays that kiss the horizon, I think of you. I imagine you up there, basking in the pleasant heat and shining down on me.

I wonder if heaven is all it's cracked up to be, or if it's even real at all. You've traveled somewhere intangible to me, though I can feel my soul reaching out to you each day in the vain hope you'll respond. My blasphemous heart painstakingly wonders why you were taken, why you could not stay a moment longer with me. Just a moment longer to say a proper goodbye.

I'm sorry for the time wasted, the time gone by without me at your side. I tried though, didn't I Daddy? To make the most out of our precious time together? I really did try my best, I promise.

It can't have been easy, trying to be strong when your body is feeling so weak. I admire you, and not in that posthumous way people often admire the departed, but in an authentic, all consuming way. I want to be like you, I want to be smart and funny, adventurous and well spoken.

There was a time when I thought you knew everything. I would find myself continuously amazed when I would bring up a seemingly abstract subject and you would inexplicably and unequivocally know all about it. You were a keeper of so much wisdom, a generous hoard of riches, treasure that you gladly shared.

I wonder if you're still cracking your signature dad jokes, or if you're still sharing your knowledge, handing it out like sweets from a tuck shop. I wonder if you're still learning, a merchant accumulating his wares, or if you're caged with only that which you knew before. There really is so much more to know Daddy, and I know your intiutive mind wouldn't be content without fresh philosophical musings to mull over. So if you're in a good place, which I pray so ardently you are, then you must still be collecting.

I'm doing the same here. I've found myself willing my brain to sponge up as much knowledge as possible, asinine as it may be, simply so people will attribute my random factoids to a likeness with you. It seems to be working out, and I enjoy accruing knowledge in the same way I believe you did, so that's something.

Was I a good daughter? Did I make you proud?

Seventeen years really isn't many in the grand scheme of things, is it? Old enough to think I always knew better, but young enough to still desperately need my father. Still, I hope I was enough for you within that time. You were always enough for me. I'm twenty now and I wish you could see me, see how much I've grown, though I wish even more ceaselessly that I could see you.

Did you ever miss your father? We never really talked about him. He was a faceless concept for most of my life, until I finally saw a picture and discovered he looked so much like you. I wonder if you were similar in mind, too. I wonder if you're with him now.

Shall we share what we've learnt since we've been apart? I'll go first. I suppose the biggest thing is that I understand now, what it means to be fatherless, though it pains me to admit it. It's a tired notion, the fact that people don't appreciate what they have until they lose it, but it's true.

Sometimes people complain, of mundane problems and silly quarrels, and despite my empathy I just want to grab them by the shoulders and shake. Don't they realise what they have? Don't they realise what they're wasting? The pure, unconditional love of a parent? You never get it back.

Once it's gone it's like a vital organ has been ripped right out of you. Then, as you collapse to the ground, choking on your own blood, flesh torn asunder and trickling with viscous red, it's shoved right in your face. You stare at it, finally aware, finally enlighted to the precious gift you have carried with you your whole life. But it's too late. It's gone. Stolen away. Tangible, but forever just out of reach.

So you lie there, steadily bleeding out with emotions so strong you can feel your soul fading. The gaping chasm in your chest continues to birth a stream of crimson, the agony unbearable and all pervading. But you won't die. You feel as though you will, but you won't. No, instead you're told to get up, get on with it. Keep moving forward, because the world won't wait for you.

So you writhe and struggle, unsteadily grappling to your feet. You stand, but you're numb now, you've lost too much of yourself to feel things like you used too. Previously imporant things are smaller now, mountains returned to molehills, as you're mind struggles to focus on anything but the aching fissure where that love used to be.

You trek the same paths as your peers, but there's bloodied foot prints in your wake. The pain slows you down, though you struggle to keep up, most people aren't inclined to wait for long. But you trudge onwards, a boat against the current, because what else is there to do?

I'm not conplete without you Daddy. Not without your laughter and your wisdom and your hugs. You are irreplacable, unforgettable and I won't stop missing you until the day we meet again. This is what I've learnt since you've been gone. How about you?