Thursday 29 November 2018

Neverending Top Ten #10.1: Walking Away




The last time I wrote an entry in my Neverending Top Ten series, I was trying to come to terms with my feelings over Sam starting school and the inevitable sense of letting go that comes with this.

Lying in bed the other night, I heard this poem on the radio and after a few lines my pillow was pretty soaked...

Walking Away

by C-Day Lewis

It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day –
A sunny day with leaves just turning,
The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you play
Your first game of football, then, like a satellite
Wrenched from its orbit, go drifting away

Behind a scatter of boys. I can see
You walking away from me towards the school
With the pathos of a half-fledged thing set free
Into a wilderness, the gait of one
Who finds no path where the path should be.

That hesitant figure, eddying away
Like a winged seed loosened from its parent stem,
Has something I never quite grasp to convey
About nature’s give-and-take – the small, the scorching
Ordeals which fire one’s irresolute clay.

I have had worse partings, but none that so
Gnaws at my mind still. Perhaps it is roughly
Saying what God alone could perfectly show –
How selfhood begins with a walking away,
And love is proved in the letting go.

Here's a song in similar vein, one I've featured here before and will no doubt feature again, one that has a similar effect on me and reminds me to treasure every moment...


8 comments:

  1. Damn my leaking eyes!

    In a similar vein, and in case your pillow dries out, I think you might get something out of a poem called Dad Reins, by Luke Wright.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you, Martin. Particularly effective considering his son is also called Sam.

      Delete
  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm hoping Cats In The Cradle won't ever be me either, but it's always there as a reminder to not take what I've got for granted.

      Delete
    2. Sorry but think I over-shared, again!

      Delete
  3. He's a lucky boy to have you as a dad, treasuring every moment.
    I only wish I could say the same about my father, who sadly shows no interest in me or anything I've done - so that's the other side of things!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well, that's a terrible loss for him - perhaps even more so than for you.

      Delete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...