HATCHET IN A KNOT Poem by Peter Semolič

Father, it's time for us to meet in wakefulness.
You, entirely of memories and ashes. I . . .

You will recognize me easily.
I bear your eyes, your chin, your destiny,
marked on my skin.

Father, it's time we admitted the existence of a hatchet,
driven into a knot.

I am not asking you for a miracle.
I am not asking you to tug at the blade.
I assent to the fact
that our hearth will forever be cold.

I am asking you for a simple admission:
we did not obey the laws of growth.

And I accept the excuse:
it was cold,
which is why the handle shivered in our grip.

Father, that is all I am asking for.

I know, you have always said
that birds are merely trees' visitors.
That the wind sifts the leaves only for itself.
But this is the way I am.

How can I throw my slender youth
onto the pyre of memory,
if there is mute steel lurking in it?

Let us admit to its existence, father.
So death will be easier for you
and life less of a burden for me.