By Alethea Black 

Early morning, and the sky and pavement are both gray and wet, but inside our car it is warm and dry in such a way it almost seems to
glow with light, at least in memory.

Outside, other cars sizzle past us on the rain-drenched street; the world is motion. But you possess the stillness that does not change; even when you switch on the classical station, time does not break, but remains smooth all around you.

Your long-fingered hands rest so delicately against the wheel, it’s
almost as if you’re not really driving. And in truth, you’re
not. You’re roaming over an equation, over and across and back again, in figure-eights.

I am in the back seat. I am ten. But you seem to have forgotten
I am here. And yet, a part of you knows—the secret part—and the air
knows, and through this air I feel something bleeding into me like ink bleeds into cloth.

You speak to me now only in dreams, this same scene pulling me like the pavement pulled the rain. Only in dreams, beneath the wipers’ rhythmic thumping, I have found the courage to whisper: Father, what is it you’re trying to tell me?

This poem is used with permission from the author, who retains the copyright. Learn more about Alethea Black here.