Little Father

Because I can not bury my father in the sky
I burn him and spread his ashes on the ground.

He loved birds yet did not feed them crumbs—
just caught them in the color of their being.

He would watch the mower plow the field,
watch the hand fill  the feeders with seed

feeling the tranquility of the man-made pond
drift towards him as he pulled the blanket from 

his chin and felt the breeze ruffle his baldness,
the bed as high to the trees as a house allows—

all the doors open to the day 
                      the night

the house receiving guest after guest,
the tables inside-outside spread for feasts,

until the last smoke of him singes my nostrils 
settles in my lungs (this strange son of his), 

floats above the branches into every nest,
leaving behind the clock spring in the fire

this nonparent of the future, this fruit 
of his,  leaving no seeds of his own.