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surprised awareness

underneath Christmas wrapping

again God is found

Christmas Greetings to All

... and it is raining in Canberra

Nativity

The thin distraction of a spider's web
Collects the clear cold drops of night.
Seeds falling on the water spread
A rippling target for the light.

The rumour in the ear now murmurs less,
The snail draws in its tender horn,
The heart becomes a bare attentiveness,
And in that bareness light is born.

James McAuley

The above seems an appropriate poem for Christmas Eve. Seeds and the start of a great transformation.

The Golden Years

I cannot see

I cannot chew  

I cannot pee
I cannot screw

. . . my God! what can I do? 

I can fumble

I can dribble

I can mumble

I can piddle

I can grumble

I can fiddle

    ... my God can I do it ... yes I I can!

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Nature self-corrects

Copenhagen is a start

Nature has no choice

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Christmas is approaching fast. Of course it is a time for family, giving, and celebration but perhaps for some too it is also a time to reflect on the incarnation and the implications of this one fact on mankind.

It raises the question of a virgin birth - its importance in the way we view the universe - and fundamentally whether we believe it as a concrete fact in the history of procreation.

In relation to religious thought and the Bible we might first reflect on how the two sexes originated. Consider the traditional words in Genesis if taken at face value. The following poem explores such unthinking acceptance ...

A Mother-In-Law Problem

it is not a well-known fact
but Eve won the Miss Universe Contest
three years running
the whole thing ribbed from above
although nobody said ‘she was one in a million'
she always scored on top
the vote a very personal affair

how could Adam vote for the blonde he'd never seen
he had magnetic affinity for dark hair
and like two jigsaw pieces they were that perfect fit

but the fourth year he had to abstain from voting
it was all Eve's doing in the cookery department
an unwise decision to make apple pie
how could she emulate her Mother-in-law
when the recipe was not God given -
but I guess she just thought she could do better!
a bit unfair on poor old Adam though! -

for Adam never looked at another woman,
never went drinking with his mates,
and treated her as his very own body

© Richard Scutter 5 September 2009

Evolution theory, and the work of Darwin have given an acceptable understanding on the origin and development of species. There would be few today that would believe in a God that acts in such a dramatic obvious way as to remove a rib overnight and startle you with a new partner for your bed, and to boot one without clothes!

So how does a virgin birth measure up in the eyes of the thinking person? Well it wouldn't happen again without making the news!

Consider the implications on Christian thought if it is discovered that Jesus in fact had normal origins. Would God be a lesser God in not understanding life from the perspective of human existence? Would our own personal relationship with God be any different? Would God still exist as that on-going power to perfect life?

There are many in the world with no understanding or acceptance of the virgin birth - is God a lesser influence in their lives?

The above questions are perhaps best addressed in terms of our own individual life experience.

But perhaps it is worth noting that such thoughts were far from the mind of the early Christian thinkers.

Their interest in Christ's person was not philosophical and speculative, but religious and evangelical. They speak of Christ, not as a metaphysical problem, but as a divine Saviour; and all they say about His person is prompted by their desire to glorify him through exhibiting his work and vindicating His centrality in the redemptive purpose of God. They never attempt to dissect the mystery of his person; it is enough for them to proclaim the incarnation as a fact, one of the sequences of mighty works where God has wrought salvation.

The exclusiveness of this evangelical interest throws light on the otherwise puzzling fact that the New Testament nowhere reflects on the virgin birth as witnessed to the conjunction of deity and manhood in His person - a line of thought much canvassed in later theology. This silence need not mean that any of the New Testament writers were ignorant of the virgin birth, as some have supposed. It is sufficiently explained by the fact that the New Testament interest is focused elsewhere, upon His relation to the saving purposes of God. (1 see footnote below)

So as christmas appoaches perhaps there is also time to to think of implications of this one fact? on the human condition - and on our own life.

Footnote ...

1
The New Bible Dictionary (Incarnation: Standpoint of the New Testament Writers) Inter-Varsity Press ISBN 0 85110 608 0

Of interest ... according to one Internet Site 80 percent of American adults believe in a virgin birth see ... http://www.religioustolerance.org/virgin_b.htm

... and sharing on a personal note ...

My God is too small not to believe in this one great all defining miracle.

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I found the following poem on the Internet … 

Birth and Death 

Death is certain for birth.
Is birth certain for death?
Post-birth is pre-death.
It is like go around and return.
Post-death is pre-birth.
It is like stay and remain.
Birth and death is better
Than no birth at all

RM. Shanmugam Chettiar23.09.2006 

… thought provoking statements that define birth in relation to death.  Death is certain for birth … death implies a change of state from life to no life … birth implies the creation of life … but is death necessarily a pre-requisite?

 What about – Birth is certain for birth 

Is birth certain for death? … birth implies life then to go to a state of no life (death) then birth is necessary. But if death = a transition to an unknown life (spiritual) … the question mark is justified? … my interpretation of the intent of his words.

Is it just going round in circles? … perhaps more like an evolutionary spiral as each birth caries forward a history (plus the continual spiritual life of those that have gone before … depending of course on your religious outlook on life)

 … anyway, like it or not, we are all caught up in this process … and life is beautiful to be celebrated … even if we do get depressed at times … enjoy this day.

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Image #36 ... Power Surfing, near Narooma MSW (you can just make out Pigeon House and The Castle in the distance on the skyline).

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Poetry at 'The Gods' 2010  ... draft program from Geoff Page

Tues Feb 9 Les Murray (Bunyah)

Tues Mar 9 Ali Cobby Eckermann ( Koolunga, S.A.) Petra White (Melbourne)
Tues Apr 13 Steve Evans (Adelaide)
Carol Jenkins (Sydney),
Tues May 11 Andy Kissane (Sydney),
Paul Cliff (Canberra)
Tues Jun 8 L.K. Holt (Melbourne)

90th Birthday Tribute to Rosemary Dobson

Tues Jul 13 Dennis Wild (Adelaide),
Mark O'Connor (Canberra),
Adrian Caesar (Canberra

Tues Jul 27 Dead Poets’ Dinner

Tues Aug 10 Andrew Lansdown (Perth),
Michele Cahill (Sydney)
Tues Sep 14 Alan Wearne (Wollongong)
Kate Llewellyn (Adelaide)
Tues Oct 12 Elizabeth Lawson (Canberra) Leon Trainor (Canberra),
Jeremy Nelson (Braidwood)
Tues Nov 9 Andy Jackson (Melbourne)
another poet yet to be finalised
Tues Dec 14 Joanne Burns (Sydney)
Robyn Rowland (Torquay, Victoria)

The Gods - ANU Canberra Poetry Readings 8pm (Dinner optional 6:30pm)

from Geoff Page - gpage40@bigpond.net.au

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Image #35 ... Santa's helpers take a break

Christmas can be quite exhausting, parties and shopping take a toll ... Sophie and AVa decide it's time to take an icecream breather. (Image courtesy of JS)

Infant Sorrow
(Songs of experience)

My mother groaned! My father wept.
Into the dangerous world I leapt,
Helpless, naked, piping loud;
Like a fiend hid in a cloud.

Struggling in my father's hands,
Striving against my swaddling bands,
Bound and weary I thought best
To sulk upon my mother's breast

Infant Joy
(Songs of innocence)

"I have no name,
I am but two days old."
What shall I call thee?
"I happy am,
Joy is my name."
Sweet joy before thee!

Pretty joy!
Sweet joy but two days old,
Sweet joy I call thee;
Thous dost smile,
I sing the while-
Sweet joy before thee.

William Blake

In both poems thoughts and feelings are placed or transfered from an adult to the newborn child. Obviously the adult's standpoint is paramount. Such transference and personification is done all the time - not only in poetry of course.

Personify ... to attribute personal nature or character to (an inanimate object or an abstraction), as in speech or writing.

I never cease to wonder at the personification of a child  ...

a grandchild playing

a shoe-box full of dolls talk

totally absorbed

... transfering some joy to those around

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A breath of air

... you saw me before I was born,
The days allotted to me
had all been recorded in your book,
before any of them ever began.
(Psalm 139 v16)

a breath of air
one breath
a breath of life, and gone

untainted by this world
your fragile existence
held the form of a perfect body
gave testimony to life

a value magnified
in the painful enormity
of the shattered lives of family
in the struggle
of your precious gift

a glimpse of being
more important
than all the stars

a breath of air
one breath
a breath of life, and gone -

forever remembered

© Richard Scutter 9 April 2008

A real trajedy when the watch stops so early. In special memory of Indiana.

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Sylvia Plath defines birth in terms of a museum and statues ...

Empty, I echo to the least footfall,
Museum without statues, grand with pillars, porticoes, rotundas.

SP (Barren Woman 21 Feb 1961).

museum ... a building used for storing and exhibiting objects of historical, scientific or culture interest.

A woman is a museum in that she carries the history of humanity. A barren woman is like an empty museum. Any noise echoes the tragedy of such a state. A museum is of little value if has no exhibits?

Statue ... a sculptured, cast, carved or moulded figure of a person or animal - especially life-size or larger.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
In a drafty museum, your nakedness
Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

SP (Morning Song 19 Feb 1961)

The echoes now have a sense of joy but the nakedness and fragility of birth is in stark contrast to the solid structure of the surrounds.

Here is the memorable first line from Morning Song ...

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.

What a strong positive statement on birth that only a mother can truly understand. Babies are fat, gold is pure and you may, or may not, believe that love generates life. A watch is an apt analogy not only to the link to the heart beat pulse tick, but to time. Birth and time are inextricably connected.

Note ...

Morning Song was the first poem of SP's self-chosen set of poems called Ariel (named after the horse she rode in Devon). A memorable first word to open the collection.

If you are down Moruya way ... Pink Rock Poets

The next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday 9 December at the Moruya Golf Club ... Dinner in the Golf Club Dining Room at 6pm followed by the poetry readings in The Meeting Room at 7pm.

The theme is Suddenly ... Feel free to bring your own creative work or read other poems in relation to the theme.

RSVP Lyn Stirling ... 4471 2442 or Email lstirling@bigpond.com

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Stillborn

These poems do not live: it's a sad diagnosis.
They grow their toes and fingers well enough,
Their little foreheads bulged with concentration.
If they missed out on walking about like people
It wasn't for any lack of mother-love.

Oh I cannot understand what happened to them!
They are proper in shape and number and every part.
They sit so nicely in the pickling fluid!
They smile and smile and smile and smile at me.
And still the lungs won't fill and the heart won't start.

They are not pigs, they are not even fish,
Though they have a piggy and fish air-
It would be better if they were alive, and that's what they were.
But they are dead, and their mother near dead with distraction,
And they stupidly stare, and do not speak of her.

Sylvia Plath  (July 1960)

SP's first poem on birth relates to herself and her other babies, namely her poems.

She uses the recurring image of embryo babies in formaldehyde as subject matter. This image must have been latent in her mind from her teenage years when she sneaked into Boston hospital with medical student Dick Norton and was confronted by such specimens.

Anne Stevenson in Bitter Fame (P197) equates the work to a light, amusing exercise in self-deprecation ... trailing a chilling wind.

Interestingly, when I first read this poem I thought the babies were primary and secondary the equating to poems, for SP had first hand experience of a miscarriage. However, her first born, Frieda, had arrived in April of that year - negating my argument. Nonetheless it is a worthy response in contemplation of such specimens from a mother's perspective.

There is an intense energy flowing from her words whether from personal loss or non-recognition of her poetry. The irony of the situation of course was recognition eventually came, but sadly, when she could not hear the applause.

I hope the following image will not offend ... a free image from the Internet (ShutterStock) ...

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Geoff Page's Monthly Readings at 'The Gods' ANU Canberra.

The final reading for '09 will be on Tues Dec 8 and will feature Judith Beveridge and Stephen Edgar, two of the country's most respected poets.

Bookings are on 6248 5538. Dinner at 6.30pm (optional). Readings at 8pm.  Admission $5.

Judith Beveridge has published four books of poetry, including The Domesticity of Giraffes , Accidental Grace and Wolf Notes . Each of them has won several major prizes. Her most recent book, just out, is Storm and Honey(from Giramondo)

Stephen Edgar is Australia's best-known and most consistent exponent of formal metres and rhyme. His latest book is Other Summers (Black Pepper 2006).

The readings will continue next year. Geoff has enlisted Les Murray to begin the 2010 series on Tues Feb 9.

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Following consideration of black/white issues in the last social issue post ...

... here is Frank the Poet in Hawaii talking to Barack Obama explaining to Barack the actual price of admission to college in California ...

"Leaving your race at the door," he said. "Leaving your people behind." He studied me over the top of his reading glasses. "Understand something, boy. You're not going to college to get educated. You're going to college to get trained. They'll train you to want what you don't need. They'll train you to manipulate words so they don't mean anything anymore. They'll train you to forget what it is that you already know. They'll train you so good, you'll start believing what they tell you about equal opportunity and the American way and all that shit. They'll give you a corner office and invite you to fancy dinners, and tell you you're a credit to your race. Until you actually want to start running things, and then they'll yank on your chain and let you know that you may be a well-trained, well-paid nigger, but you're a nigger just the same."

... text taken from Dreams From My Father (Barack Obama) (1995, 2004) Page 97

... well it has always been the bottom line of non-acceptance against an intruder from the outside ... that old anyway exclusion line ... in this case ‘anyway he's a nigger' ... but it could well be ‘anyway he's from Canberra'!

... but wouldn't Frank the poet get a shock today to know that Barack got to the very pinnacle of American establishment ... against all odds ... an African American, brought up with no live-in father and to survive against the strong racial prejudices of his childhood without bitterness. The non-acceptance of blacks cynically portrayed by Frank in the above text.

Breaking that Anyway Line

‘look guys, he's gone above our heads
without any proper consultation
some people may be happy
to side with the government on this issue
... anyway the faithful remain true blue'

but it was the stuff of dreams
even if Frank the Poet could not imagine it
the line broken by Barack
and America blessed

but how audacious to expect a true blue change

Footnote ...

At the end of the day ... what a blueming mess ... perhaps ETS the only winner.

Update 1 Dec ... by a vote of 42:41 the religious right have taken control ... an Abbot and a Bishop ... but religion and politics, never good bedfellows. A different ETS looks likely ... after Copenhagen.

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Images #34 ... Changing Colour of Mt Painter - Canberra

The unprecedented scorching heat of November has taken an early toll on the local scene ... and does not auger well for the coming summer (which officially starts next Tuesday 1 Dec - ending 28 Feb) ... some words in that regard

 ... and I note there are a few Canberra sceptics around who are not willing to take the heat -perhaps they should look out their window.

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... more than shades of prejudice ...

The Telephone Conversation

The price seemed reasonable, location
indifferent. The landlady swore she lived
off premises. Nothing remained
but self- confession "Madam, I warned,
"I hate a wasted journey- I am African."
Silence. Silenced transmission of
pressurised good - breeding. Voice, when it came
lipstick-coated, long gold-rolled
cigarette- holder pipped. Caught I was foully
"HOW DARK?...... I had not misheard......
"ARE YOU LIGHT OR VERY DARK?" Button B, Button A, stench
of rancid breath of public hide-and -speak
Red booth. Red pillar box. Red double-tiered
omnibus squelching tar. It was real. Shamed
by ill-mannered silence, surrender
pushed dumbfounded to beg simplification.
Considerate she was, varying the emphasis-
"ARE YOU DARK? OR VERY LIGHT?" Revelation came
"You mean -like plain or milk chocolate?"
Her assent was clinical, crushing in its light
impersonality, rapidly, wave length adjusted,
I chose "West African sepia"- and as afterthought,
"Down in my passport." Silence for spectroscopic
flight of fancy, till truthfulness clanged her accent
hard on the mouthpiece. "WHAT IS THAT?" conceding
"DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT IS" "Like brunette."
THAT'S DARK, ISN'T IT?" Not altogether,
facially, I am a brunette, but Madam you should see
the rest of me. Palm of my hand, soles of my feet
are a peroxide blonde. Friction caused
foolishly, Madam - by sitting down, has turned
my bottom raven black- One moment - sensing
her receiver rearing on the thunderclap
about my ears- "Madam" I pleaded "wouldn't you rather
see for yourself?"

Wole Soyinka

Wole Soyinka, a Nigerian who has won great acclaim as a poet. Nobel Laureate 1986. The above relates to a personal experience in England (I think in the 50s in London).

Great sense of humour and word choice ... the triple red response to such indignity ... and I particularly like the peroxide (artifical) blonde feet.

Details of Wole on Wikipedia

William Blake (1757 - 1827) is a ‘must' when considering social commentary in poetry

... interestingly he wrote ‘songs' in two distinct voices ... that of innocence and that of experience ... the same theme presented in different colours ...

"Songs of Innocence and Experience" was written by Blake in the 1790s. The main theme of the poems in this work came from Blake's belief that children lost their "innocence" as they grew older and were influenced by the ways of the world. Blake believed that children were born innocent. They grew to become experienced as they were influenced by the beliefs and opinions of adults. When this happened, they could no longer be considered innocent. The poems from "Songs of Innocence" were written from an innocent child's perspective. Those from "Songs of Experience" were written from the perspective of a more experienced person who had seen all of the evil in the world and had, in a way, become bitter towards it.

... here is the last stanza from his Chimney Sweeper poem (from Songs of Innocence) ...

And so Tom awoke; and we rose in the dark.
And got with our bags & our brushes to work.
Tho' the morning was cold, Tom was happy & warm;
So if all do their duty they need not fear harm

... I seem to remember another well-known poet speaking strongly against ‘doing duty' as a cover for the dictates of the establishment.

... the above italics text was taken from this link to some of his poems plus analysis ...

... thought ... poetry is more effective when subtle ... do you agree ... and on the really heavy side, have you seen 2012 (not really recommended, I had a free ticket) compare with An Inconvenient Truth.

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Green to Brown

this is no gentle autumn smile
to colour the slip of an ageing year

and after the cool generosity
of early spring rain
there was a certain prospect
that the greening of the land
was more than just a transient flush

but dashed in days
this frown of burning brown
colours more than the fast changing hills
as the thought of summer heat
sweats at an already exhausted body

Richard Scutter

News Report ... 19 Nov ...

Australia's first ''catastrophic'' fire danger warning has been issued as a Victoria braces for its first day of extreme bushfire risk since Black Saturday. The ''catastrophic'' warning has been declared for South Australian regions close to Port Augusta and Port Pirie for tomorrow. Catastrophic is the highest possible warning, and was created after Black Saturday.

... and in Canberra, the first 20 days of November (Spring) ... have yielded an average daily maximum temperature above thirty degrees ... conditions easily equivalent to January summer heat ... today 38.

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Flowing from the ACT Writers Poetry Festival (13-15 Nov) ...

... well apparently if you are going to have a Poetry Festival then best not to call it a Poetry Festival!

... an interesting discussion on ‘bringing poetry to the masses' ... not a good choice in words a bit like ‘fun run'

... poetry is individual absorption that stirs the soul ... my words ... well perhaps ... not a mantra or slogan to be followed by the thoughtless ... though I was surprised by Shelley (of all poets) wanting a hymn of words for the Labour Movement (see this previous Post)

... but do we need to market poetry like ice creams and who cares if the masses want to go to ... (I almost said football, not soccer) ... rather than sit under a tree trying to unravel TSE

... apparently Philip Larkin said that TSE killed poetry in that he intellectualised the word bringing a snobbery ... the message from the discussion however was towards greater access ability ... but should that be from the poet or by the reader ... and what is wrong with a bit of good old thinking - provided it's not just obscure nonsense

... and Geoff Page is right to say that a good poem should provide a lingering taste at first reading engendering deeper understanding with subsequent readings

... one comment, and I think this very true, there are many more writing than reading ... why is this ... well may be this is the only way people can be heard in our demanding world ... and of course Blogs, Emails, SMS all add solid reason to this trend

... and is rap that bad ... well yes, and John Foulcher is so right, we do need to bring the best of literature to the mind of the searching student ... and what an excellent job he does at that ... the richness and beauty of language should be introduced to all (not in any didactic way of course)

... but for me Paul Mcgee took the innovative cake for his novel idea on the importance of promoting ignorance ... I humbly agree and stand in awe at the new picture this presents ...

this centre of ignorance ...

(with a thankyou to Paul Mcgee, following his address at the ACT Writers Poetry Festival, advocating a Centre of Ignorance at Canberra University)

swells in my mind
and stuns to shock an awareness
and aha yes!, this is what it is all about
what poems do, or what they can do!

like catching the beauty of the world
the movement of a woman in fresh eyes
sparkling a spontaneous discovery
amazing in its undressed vitality

yes, it is a foreign language that
decoded stirs to Beatrice country
a catalyst that lures the latent senses
mapped within the imagination

and any student in Alzheimer quest
carries that certain expectation
even an excitement more than bliss
that only ignorance provides

Richard Scutter

... well I hope you are all hearing me on this, not just seeing it red (yes, humour is needed too)

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Mending Wall

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbour know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
"Stay where you are until our backs are turned!"
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, "Good fences make good neighbours."
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
"Why do they make good neighbours? Isn't it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That wants it down." I could say "Elves" to him,
But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, "Good fences make good neighbours."

Robert Frost

Last week it was celebration on the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall ... there are quite a few more walls that need a little attention in this regard ... separation never solves social issues

... and in Australia it's a question of how to have a gap with a filter to cater for the flow of refugees

... and we all need our personal space ... which is another issue.

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He was not superstitious

‘I am not superstitious' -
He used to tell us all the time
and he never cared about numbers
you know birthdays and all that
or writing meaning into anything that happened.

It was just a touch unfortunate
that when we walked round the ladder
he missed the paint but not the car.
And in the ambulance with the siren blaring
saying to the nurse - ‘we all have to die some day'.

But later all his family thought he was so unlucky
for it to happen on Friday the thirteenth.

Richard Scutter

... buy a lottery ticket - you could be lucky ... chances are you will have a good day ... if you work at it.

Image #33 ... Iris Hill Garden (Tijara) at Burra (near Queanbeyan NSW)

Six Gardens were open to the public last weekend ... Burra is on the Cooma road out of Queanbeyan ... the hills are looking very green ... this will change quickly ... we are currently having a week with temperatures in the thirties ... it is only the first half of November. The profits from the weekend are to be used by Queanbeyan Lions for community work.

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The following anonymous poem was sent to me via the Internet a couple of weeks ago - it is Remembrance Day so perhaps appropriate text - have a read and see what you think ...

Daddy's Poem

Her hair was up in a ponytail,
Her favourite dress tied with a bow.
Today was Daddy's Day at school,
and she couldn't wait to go.

But her mommy tried to tell her,
that she probably should stay home.
Why the kids might not understand,
if she went to school alone.

But she was not afraid;
She knew just what to say.
What to tell her classmates
of why he wasn't there today.

But still her mother worried,
for her to face this day alone.
And that was why once again,
She tried to keep her daughter home.

But the little girl went to school
Eager to tell them all.
About a dad she never sees
a dad who never calls
.
There were daddies along the wall in back,
for everyone to meet.
Children squirming impatiently,
Anxious in their seats

One by one the teacher called
a student from the class.
To introduce their daddy,
as seconds slowly passed.

At last the teacher called her name,
every child turned to stare.
Each of them was searching,
A man who wasn't there.

'Where's her daddy at?'
She heard a boy call out.
'She probably doesn't have one,'
another student dared to shout.

And from somewhere near the back,
She heard a daddy say,
'Looks like another deadbeat dad,
too busy to waste his day.'

The words did not offend her,
as she smiled up at her Mom.
And looked back at her teacher,
who told her to go on.

And with hands behind her back,
slowly she began to speak.
And out from the mouth of a child,
came words incredibly unique.

'My Daddy couldn't be here,
because he lives so far away.
But I know he wishes he could be,
since this is such a special day.

And though you cannot meet him,
I wanted you to know.
All about my daddy,
and how much he loves me so.

He loved to tell me stories
He taught me to ride my bike.
He surprised me with pink roses,
and taught me to fly a kite.

We used to share fudge sundaes,
and ice cream in a cone.
And though you cannot see him.
I'm not standing here alone.

'Cause my daddy's always with me,
Even though we are apart
I know because he told me,
He'll forever be in my heart'

With that, her little hand reached up,
And lay across her chest.
Feeling her own heartbeat,
beneath her favourite dress.

And from somewhere here in the crowd of dads,
Her mother stood in tears.
Proudly watching her daughter,
who was wise beyond her years.

For she stood up for the love
of a man not in her life.
Doing what was best for her,
Doing what was right.

And when she dropped her hand back down,
staring straight into the crowd.
She finished with a voice so soft,
but its message clear and loud.

'I love my daddy very much;
he's my shining star.
And if he could, he'd be here,
but heaven's just too far.

You see he was a Royal Marine
and died just this past year
when a roadside bomb hit his convoy
and taught Britains how to fear.

But sometimes when I close my eyes,
it's like he never went away.'
And then she closed her eyes,
and saw him there that day.

And to her mothers amazement,
She witnessed with surprise.
A room full of daddies and children,
all starting to close their eyes.

Who knows what they saw before them,
who knows what they felt inside.
Perhaps for merely a second,
they saw him at her side.

'I know you're with me Daddy,'
to the silence she called out.
And what happened next made believers,
of those once filled with doubt.

Not one in that room could explain it,
for each of their eyes had been closed.
But there on the desk beside her,
was a fragrant long-stemmed rose.

And a child was blessed, if only for a moment,
by the love of her shining star.
And given the gift of believing,
that heaven is never too far.

Author unknown

Perhaps written in the context of a British soldier killed in Iraq ... to my mind a bit didactic with the protracted rose coloured pen of a parent (grandparent)...

However, it does raise the issue (whether war related or not) on, and how, a young child copes with the death of a parent ... especially when put on the spot ... in this case by a brave school that was game to put on such a day ... hopefully they prepared beforehand!

... another related issue how do you give spiritual understanding of death to a child ... well heaven knows ... at least from a Christian perspective there is never permanent closure and the dead parent lives on in some form.

... digressing, I recently attended a grandparent day at the local preschool where grandparents could share time with the activities, one little girl shared with me that her granny had to work ... perhaps one reason for a low attendance

Apparently Barack Obama's father spoke at Barack's school and this greatly improved his status in the class ... Barack was a little concerned at the time because he had given his class mates a completely false image ... his father was black and from a mystery country (Kenya) and there was great curiosity ... after his Dad spoke Barack was given much needed respect in his class as a black person (Re: Dreams From My Father)