This piece is very nostalgic and a bit on the sad side. Judy Katz-Levine published this poem in 1990 as part of a collection entitled When the Arms of Our Dreams Embrace.
*
Falling asleep in the afternoon,
I forget that my father has died.
I anticipate him calling me up,
asking me how my writing is going,
and am I thinking about having children.
Making a joke or two. “Don’t worry,
Mom and I will never be lonely.”
Then I fall into deeper sleep, he
loses me, traveling in his car, the green
Chevrolet, to old baseball fields,
which are sweet with rye grass
and lush stadiums, his pals throwing
him the ball – “Give me some pepper, Al.”
I’ve been reading this over a few times and it really has no time, nothing linear anyway, more like a circle that never ends or maybe i’m over analyzing it. whatever, i really like it, especially how it brings the father back to life, like he never died in the first place.
It does seem that way. By the end, it even seems like his existence is more tangible than hers. The first time I read it and then re-read it, I was jolted upon the reminder that he had passed away.