Zinnias, dahlias, peonies all pluck from the sweet
air of those faraway spring days another breathless
yearning for warmer things. We dream of golden
angles of sun, silver scribbles of rain, the thronging
noise of the earth waking again in soggy greenness.

THE FATHER: All night, I nursed
a candle’s flame, leaning in and out
of its sphere of light, mumbling verses
of the Qur’an, mispronouncing
the Arabic, not understanding a word
beyond “Al-Fatiha,” but knowing,
nonetheless, I had fulfilled
this first obligation of fatherhood.