To God My Father In The January Sleet Remembered Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

he's always branching off into leaves into little asides of flowers

momentary novas

how can he help it


try to hold a conversation with him just once

and you'll see what I mean

don't ever challenge him to acolouring contest


He's the Colour Wheel!


before you can even get the blue crayon out of the box

he's coloured Everything and added red rainbows.

take music for an example


you've got a tune in your head

he's got cathedrals full, gushing waterfalls and Messiaen

the whole works and the fourth of July too


not only Sousa and the 1812 Overture, boom boom.

He likes Charles Ives. And being Alive.

We're all fireworks to him and my friend,


he doesn't ever use stencils.


he's all the worlds fairs and all that's fair

not only in love and war;

he has the scars to prove it


and the wherewithall to be

the peddler of all peddlers

come and see


the vintage scarves over canyons, the shawls to brooches wed

the hoarding of valentines one single Iris

extended from the child with the grubby hand


treasured.


he's without overhead on luncheonettes

with banana cream pies; he likes to riddle you or I

the tiny riddles in the Bazooka wrappers, bubble gum


in pink or green. treading the boards incessantly

in every Shakespearian scene.


he's without measure, measuring sticks, clocks that tick

he doesn't need Time

or a thousand doves on his Birthday


he hasn't got one. or Mercury dimes, come to think of it.

sometimes he longs for a rose piped cake,

the frosting left in the bowl, I think so,


the little seed cakes out of Tolkien


or on the brink of snowfalls wishes for us

a thousand thousand Christmases

all at once


arriving as

we get off the bus

in a cold and sleety January


to a slightly unheated apartment.

oh he's a Department store

on every floor you'll find Him taking the escalator to...


especially the perfume aisle with his white floral notes

a hint of orange blossom, citrus, citrus, He smiles


sighing in jasmine, ruffling the coastal waters

oh sons and daughtes or look for him


out in the mists herding the clouds of mignonette

and even in this

impossible possible poem.apparent

in mirror writing.


mary angela douglas 20 august 2018