Hi Dad,
Here I am back in Athens
Just over 40 years since you left it
Here I am in Athens, from Rome
Just less than two years since you left us.
I still don’t know how these things work
But I hope that you know I’m here
I hope you can see and feel what I see and feel
I hope you know that I’m thinking of you in this historic place
where our own story took such an important turn.
The Acropolis is still standing proud
offering a view of both the best of our past
and the wide-open hopes of the future.
The souvlaki still sizzles, tzatziki still tangs,
the feta still sublime, the lamb – of the gods.
The Greeks, as always, open, warm,
relaxed, unbothered, singular.
I walk the streets and the alleyways
same as we once did
Wondering what was in your mind at that time
What hopes, worries, joys, concerns
Bounced around in this friendly foreign place.
Sitting on the famous cliffs on the side of Areopagus hill
where textbook Greek philosophers once debated
and teenagers ditch their textbooks for nighttime drinks
I try to take it all in, all of Athens, Greece, humanity,
As I’m sure you once did.
Thinking about life, death, beauty
in the soft sunshine,
Grand thinkers and lowly tinkerers all the same.
Deep thoughts at the end of selfie sticks.
I’m here to help some people come to Canada
Playing my small part in their stories.
I know you’d be happy and proud
and amazed and bemused
At how random, perfect and circular life can be.
How we’re plucked from some places at some times, dropped into others,
occasionally to return, in a few days, in a few decades, most times to move on forever,
For Good.
I hope to bring Aleksander here one day
to share Greece’s myths, as well as our own.
And I hope you’ll pop in then
to whisper in his ear into his heart
Let him know how it was to be you
Here with me
Both then and now.
Dad In The World 