A Mountain, Glinting Through the Sun

'Self explanatory, don't think anyone needs to ask how I feel about this man"

A picture of my father

around fifteen, standing

at the foot of the mountain

glinting through the sun.

He is holding a stick

at first glance,
a kid mugging for the camera--

but look closer, you see

the stick's a rail
he's laying fence
mid-winter laughing--

already more mountain than the mountain.

Two decades, two years, since we put him down,
I'm still in awe of the man
the mountain made--

of him shuffling home
bone-dry weary
laughing, four bean sprouts
dangling, two to an arm--

feet six inches into the mud
oil slicked manila hemp wrapped
around the waist
anchoring ten boozy teamsters
in a will of strength--
metro's finest blues never stood a chance.

A late September afternoon
standing in the door frame of
an Orillia hospital room
trying not to show the fear I felt
looking across at a busted broken blacktop rider
so tough not even a hard charging locomotive
could take him down

another twenty-two years living
hell, body racked
into a shell too small for a mountain man
to breath without remembering
the race across the tracks

the last few hours, a flame slowly ebbing,

still too tough to show

he wasn't tougher than that mountain.

I feel him yet, glinting through the sun.

Ken e Bujold

2022

Reviews

[Chris Shaw]

Absolutely no doubt how much admired and missed your Father is. A wonderful write taking the reader through his life from the young boy to his death. He had it tough, very tough. That made him the man he was. GREAT read Ken.

Chris

[Ken e Bujold]

thanks for the kindness of thought Chris

[Neville]

Having now read through this amazing eulogy three times thus far & back on back .. I can still feel the residual remains of the first shiver that hit my spine .. Upon the second read, I could not distinguish between shock wave of the first or the emerging second rush .. I have no doubt the third will hit me shortly ..
Truly a beautiful poem dedicated to an amazing gentleman ........... Neville

[Ken e Bujold]

thank you Neville. The most difficult emotional moment in my life was delivering the eulogy for this man, this write ran a close 2nd.

[John the Baptist]

The admiration of the speaker for his father is obvious. The man in his youth comes across as a force of nature. When the poem suddenly turns to his debility (and we must wonder whether the locomotive is real or metaphorical), the speaker's fear is almost palpable. The last lines are painful to read; we wince when thinking of the once indomitable as now "racked into a shell." A very moving memoir here.

[Ken e Bujold]

no sadly john it was literal

[Ken e Bujold]

thank you for your very kind and thoughtful review my friend