At the breakfast table this morning
the ghost of my father
dunks his folded toast into his coffee.
I watch awestruck, my
hands full of pens, my heart stuck
open. My father does
not acknowledge me, his eyes scanning
the news for word of
the flood victims, now his, now with
him, now and forever.
My father’s ghost smiles a smile of
rue. His time of haunting me
is onerous for him. His great head longs
only to rest, to not know
the terrible news, to dream of the balance
