A Request Of The Dying

Here we are.

The afternoon light
retreats gently through the blinds,
and the day’s shadows,
which were earlier laid upon the floor in their infancy,
now grow long and tired.

Night will soon embrace them
and collect them for good.

I wonder, as I hold your hand,
what might you be thinking in this moment?

Are there dreams of us
and our earliest of days together?
Of our joys as father and son?

If memory’s brush ever painted such times in my then young mind,
the years since have wiped clean the canvas.
But, surely,
for you,
the colors are still sharp
and you remember.

Tell me, then
what we were like.

Back then.

Tell me of the moment
just before I made my first steps alone.
Tell me of the smiles we surely smiled
before you let me go.

Just as time will collect this day for its own,
I know that it calls for all of yours.
You will too soon surrender them,
and they will fall softly into the darkness.

So that the memories do not go with them,
please,
tell me of our times together.

Tell me how I made you happy.

Tell me how I made you proud.

Please.

Tell me what we were like,
before I let you go.