filling in for Santa

I didn't say this

at your funeral

because you wouldn't have wanted me

to say it in front of the kids

but

I never loved you more

than at 2am on

Christmas morning,

watching you yawn

over the tape dispenser,

fumbling through

each crease and fold,

the way you curled a ribbon

between your thumb

and the scissor blade.

*

Or the year you insisted

on pressing "reindeer tracks"

into the muddy yard.

*

Or the loop and swirl of your script

counterfeiting a thank-you note from Santa

left next to the empty glass and plate.

*

The way you could flip pancakes

on ninety minutes of sleep

and four cups of coffee

to the sounds of shrieking

and the rip and crumple destruction

of all that careful wrapping.

*

Did you know then,

behind my grumbles and sighs

that some small part of me

became a child again?

How you thought

you were spinning all that magic

for them,

but caught me too,

in that sugarplum spell?

*

I told the kids

you were Santa's best deputy,

but that I'd try my hardest.

Tonight, I'll cry into my coffee

when the ribbons won't curl

and Santa's thank-you note

will have to be typed,

but oh, love,

I'll do it all

for the moment we wake up,

and can believe just enough

in magic

to think that you were here.