How do you capture
a lifetime of fatherhood
put it down on the page?
Your voice in times of doubt
your hand on my shoulder
your cup always half full.
Yet, it wasn’t what you said
year after year that I remember most
you stood beside
you held up others
you lead with love.
You showed me.
Dedicated to my dearly loved father, Thomas Jenkins, who has fathered many over the years as an educator and coach. No words will ever be enough to tell you how much I love you.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2017
The first bowl of summer strawberries picked from my backyard.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2017
Random thoughts collect in her hair.
Ideas shed by passers by
printed in fonts, large and small
nestled in her curls.
Within the crowd ideas conflict
like a crash of cymbals.
She swallows them all
continues to shift the molecules
search for a new formula
that makes sense.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2017
Why?
One word with the power to
kick my brain from the inside.
Why did I pick this?
Why is it important to me?
Without this one word question
procrastination can run amok.
Why does finishing this matter?
Will anyone care?
Is it worth it?
I am just one
among billions.
Just plain old me.
What if I don’t?
What will be lost?
Will I cease to exist?
The why of
is always
the essential.
© Alicia Grimshaw 2017
Inspired by Nikki’s post titled “Doubts and Dreams” – Flying Through Water
Never adrift
always within arm’s length
inseparable as far back
as memory will reach,
weathered worn wise
with fantasies of
chain breaking
to float free.
In the unfinished
before the credits scroll past
can you choose acceptance
without an end,
before the conclusion
without approval from the crowd?
Between the ribs, within
deeply, a voice
the one you used to hear
before you thought the others
were the ones that mattered.
Knew better and overruled your soul.
Before you decided
who you weren’t going to be.
There is no hourglass
of time
in love.
It matters not,
if months or years pass,
love is beyond physical bodies
beyond boundaries.
Like a favorite song
heard from the middle of the tune.
There is no less joy to listen.
Locked away, rust resistant
“Love has no expiration date.”
© Alicia Grimshaw 2017
Photo taken in 2016 while hiking on the Cinque Terre in Italy.
flashlight batteries - Ali Grimshaw 