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Sport 4: Autumn 1990

Lynn Davidson — Misconception

page 118

Lynn Davidson

Misconception

'My dad lives in Canada'
you tell a friend
'In Canada people sleep in the day
and go out at night, to work
and parks and things'.
I realise I haven't explained the situation
clearly enough or
perhaps you want to think you and your father
sleep and play together across oceans,
that one would not think of sleeping
while the other strode out taking on
the whole wide world.
That he would visit a park in winter mid
night to imagine you
careering down a slide in slapdash sunshine
here, in a more normal country.
I go on dissecting vegetables, running water,
drying my hands on the tea towel,
pretending not to hear, avoiding
the danger of 'putting you right' and also
too absorbed imagining this stranger
your father
moving through a huge black park
like a small boat
trawling for its shadow.