Banging My Head on My Dad The day my father died I struck my head hard against the cupboard above my laundry tubs that caught my crown as I straightened suddenly, though wash days had been mishap-free till then. “Wake up and cheer up!” a paternal voice had boomed a second later. . . . Through decades, we’d barely spoken. The day my father died I sensed his soul high above, heading northwest (a line from his home to mine and beyond), his lightless fundamentalist bellowing and bullying having dissolved between doctors cutting his vagus nerve and his having found joy in Jesus. The day my father died I contemplated our reconnection the forty miles to his farm and there lay a stiff, silent form. I didn’t know whether to grieve or rejoice, being both sad and glad that day I banged my head on my dad.
A former journalist and book editor, Neall Calvert has had poetry published in books, journals and online in the United States, Canada and abroad, most recently in Worth More Standing: Poets and Activists Pay Homage to Trees (Caitlin: 2022), Laugh Lines (Repartee: 2023) and the journal Sea & Cedar (three poems, Summer 2022). A student of trauma recovery and healing, Neall is an associate member of the League of Canadian Poets and writes from the quiet and wildness of northern Vancouver Island, BC, Canada.
Amethyst Review 