ManicDDaily

The last few days I’ve written about parenting–engaging young kids and encouraging “make-believe”–and sonnets.  So today, I thought I’d combine all subjects.  (I don’t mean the “make-believe” comment to refer to the religious aspects of the poem, but the bedtime story.)   The sonnet is Shakespearean in rhyme scheme (and attempted meter.)

My Father

My father knelt beside my bed; his round head
reflecting the bedside lamp with the look
of lighting within.  “And the genie,” he said,
“came out of a big blue jar.”  Not from a book
were the stories he told me at night.
Always of genies who were big-blue-jarred
and did fairly little, only the slight
magic of minor wishes, often ill-starred.
Though the stories were just a warm up to
the bedtime prayer.  “Our Father,” that would start,
then straight out head for “hallowed”, “trespass” too,
unknown words, to me a spell he knew by heart,
invoking, croakingly, a wished-for will
that the blue genied jar could never fulfill.

(All rights reserved.  Karin Gustafson)