Ashes in River Wind

Ashes in River Wind
© Surazeus
2025 05 09

The frail dented urn of gray lightweight tin 
appears to gleam with temporary light. 
My father lounges in back of my car 
with silent sorrow wedged behind the seat 
where he once scolded me for driving fast, 
his breath still rich with church wine and regret. 

He hated rivers. “Too slow to be clean,” 
he would growl, and glower past the steel bridge 
where bodies of the dead were tossed with prayers. 
I scatter his ashes on wrinkled shore 
as wind stirs up harsh cough of ash and grit, 
his judgment sticking in the folded sky. 

Gaunt boy throws stones that plunk in shallow pool 
with unapologetic splash of burdened facts 
that fools waste their time attempting to change, 
since what floats returns, but what sinks dissolves, 
yet still we throw our stones of failed advice 
as futile warnings pitched in widening dusk. 

I clutch his empty wallet in pale hands 
with tickets, bus schedules, list of passwords, 
expired drivers license with manic smirk, 
and notes from mother in flowery script, 
scraps of unspoken thoughts he tried to hide 
in ledger scribbled on the back of hope. 

I do not mind the minister is late, 
but when he calls him Robert, and not Cal, 
I chuckle with blind angels small as motes, 
then mouth Hail Mary with faith-thirsty lips. 
We read some psalm that weakly conjures faith 
because we like our gods with blistered skin. 

When evening folds its sleeves, I pour him out 
to release his ashes in river wind 
as shrill train horn cuts clouds with soft despair, 
indifferent to the liturgy of dust. 
With calm acceptance of the way things are 
I fill father-shaped absence with respect. 

I drive back home with silence on the dial 
down roads slick with thaw of time-soggy bark 
while his distorted voice in swirling fog 
offers no confession in evening rain 
that mixes his ashes in dark river flow 
so he can measure endless flow of time. 

The river takes what we are meant to lose 
when water lifts his name, then drags it down. 
I feel oak trees relearn their winter stance,  
unmoved, unburdened, lacking even grief. 
With return of the rain I almost hear 
his voice declare the end of honest truth.