so many ways our fathers mark us by Alvin Pang ( Andrea)

(for kirpal and christopher)

so many ways our fathers mark us

each syllable of bone, phrasing of flesh, but also
the skin we put on, a way of letting our fathers speak
through and for us, with each other
always a hair's breadth away from refusal

and later the heft and weight of language
oar and rudder on the palate, finding our own
stained grammar in the wood-ash of their passing,
heaving the smoking axes on our tongues

as the shadowy wings behind our mothers,
reminders also that memory turns to seed

in beatings and beratings, in carefully counted cane-strokes
which sting on my thigh twenty years after their fading

he may tell you the names of angsana, balsam, cherry blossom
he may teach you the meaning of bereft

you may never become him
though you spend your life running to catch up
already he is in the distance, waving with his arms
(which you think beckon you forward): go elsewhere

each year you reach less to kiss him
there is less fur to tug at, and more snow

each year he takes one more step into the storehouse of images
he takes his place among the harried shopkeepers, the angels
and fallen kings, the sleeping heroes and carpenters

often we mark our fathers down
we put down the book and he is there
eyes on an elsewhere outside of you

only when you nudge the door open on an empty room
do you truly hear him
the dust whispers it; your footsteps form the vowels

every day you relearn his name
as you clear your throat to speak

The Backseat of My Mother's Car by Julia Copus (Andrea)

We left before I had time
to comfort you, to tell you that we nearly touched
hands in that vacuous half-dark. I wanted
to stem the burning waters running over me like tiny
rivers down my face and legs, but at the same time I was reaching out
for the slit in the window where the sky streamed in,
cold as ether, and I could see your fat mole-fingers grasping
the dusty August air. I pressed my face to the glass;
I was calling to you – Daddy! – as we screeched away into
the distance, my own hand tingling like an amputation.
You were mouthing something I still remember, the noiseless words
piercing me like that catgut shriek that flew up, furious as a sunset
pouring itself out against the sky. The ensuing silence
was the one clear thing I could decipher –
the roar of the engine drowning your voice,
with the cool slick glass between us.
With the cool slick glass between us,
the roar of the engine drowning, your voice
was the one clear thing I could decipher –
pouring itself out against the sky, the ensuing silence
piercing me like that catgut shriek that flew up, furious as a sunset.
You were mouthing something: I still remember the noiseless words,
the distance, my own hand tingling like an amputation.
I was calling to you, Daddy, as we screeched away into
the dusty August air. I pressed my face to the glass,
cold as ether, and I could see your fat mole-fingers grasping
for the slit in the window where the sky streamed in
rivers down my face and legs, but at the same time I was reaching out
to stem the burning waters running over me like tiny
hands in that vacuous half-dark. I wanted
to comfort you, to tell you that we nearly touched.
We left before I had time.

Miles Away by Carol Ann Duffy

I want you and you are not here. I pause
in this garden, breathing the colour thought isbefore language into still air.
Even your name is a pale ghost and, though I exhale it again
and again, it will not stay with me. Tonight
I make you up, imagine you, your movements clearer
than the words I have you say you said before.

Wherever you are now, inside my head you fix me
with a look, standing here whilst cool late light
dissolves into the earth. I have got your mouth wrong,
but still it smiles. I hold you closer, miles away,
inventing love, until the calls of nightjars
interrupt and turn what was to come, was certain,
into memory. The stars are filming us for no one.

contributed by Izza