Sport 14: Autumn 1995
My Father’s Flowers
My Father’s Flowers
Otherwise, he had an aversion
To projects of beautification,
Preferring the rugged or jagged
Sawed-off ends of pipe and chain,
Cemented post holes and black clods
Of soil, to the finer, delicate world
Of lace drapery and placemats,
The surgical accuracies of cooking
And cleaning he left to my mother
And sister. But, after the doctors
Pronounced his death sentence,
One year, maybe more if his luck
And kidneys held out, he improbably
Planted rose bushes, dozens of
Them, along the fence and driveway,
And spent hours tending them, clipping,
Pruning and pampering them. He
Preferred the deep reds and soft white
Buds lined with delicate veins and would
Sit in a folding deck chair under the
Umbrella tree in the back yard, chain
Smoking and surveying the progress
Of his garden. The medication he was
Taking made him susceptible to cuts
And he often bled from his fingers or
Cheeks, from thorn scratches or
Razor nicks, his blood failing to clot,
Dripping in thin lines down his wrists
Or face. ‘It’s nothing,’ he would say
When I pointed to this or that cut, and
It was only at my insistence that he
Would wipe away the lines with
An old wash cloth or wet paper towel.