Kaddish for My Father
Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’mai rabah…
I’ve said the mourner’s kaddish now a thousand times
To mark the 30 years since I last held your hand
And hoped that you could hear me through the tubes and drone
Of the machines that kept your weak lungs pumping air.
This Aramaic prayer goes back two thousand years.
The words mean “Glorified and sanctified be God’s
Great name throughout the world…” There’s so much more, of course.
But, Abba, then my thinking wanders back to you.
I still remember all the things you did for me
From roaring discipline to sleepless nights when I
Was sick; your anger when I snuck off with the car.
The boundless pride you showed when I first started school
With hopes that I might live the dreams denied to you.
How much you loved your family. How hard you worked
To make sure that we had a home and food to eat!
I still can see your glower when I gave you lip
And forced me to learn manners when I acted rude.
And, Abba, I can still remember all you taught:
The way to ride a bike so that I wouldn’t fall,
The way to cope when “love forever” did not last;
And later on—much later—how to live with death.
A vast kaleidoscope of moments fill my mind:
The smiles and sobs, the gains and losses, fears and hopes.
You labored hard—so often working through the night
And yet you never let us see your weary stress.
How you loved mom. How you loved each of us.
I’m prouder of you, Abba, than I’ve ever been.
I hope you know your memory will never fade
And that my love stays strong these decades since you died.
A sigh. I’m glad you left before the world grew hateful.
And for this final mercy I am truly grateful.
Brian Yapko is a retired lawyer whose poetry has appeared in over fifty journals. He is the winner of the 2023 SCP International Poetry Competition. Brian is also the author of several short stories, the science fiction novel El Nuevo Mundo and the gothic archaeological novel Bleeding Stone. He lives in Wimauma, Florida.
This is a wonderful tribute to your father, and by extension to all fathers. A father as good and loving as yours was deserves all honor, but even those fathers who may have been wanting in some respects always have some quality that allows them to be remembered with respect and affection.
Your choice of a hexameter line seemed strange at first, but as I read the unrhymed lines I sensed that what you wanted for this poem was complete freedom of expression, and plenty of space in which to fit the details. Ending with a rhymed couplet was a touch that added proper closure after all had been said. And addressing your father by the traditional “Abba” added a note of devoted reverence, linked to the Kaddish prayer that begins the poem.
The words summon up a full array of the emotions that predominate in family life: love, pride, anger, suffering, hope, worry, disappointment, and fear. All of them (and more) are part of the kaleidoscope of feelings that exist between a parent and a child. What you have done is to present them with acceptance, even the ones that are necessarily painful — and perhaps even alienating — at times. What they all resolve into, in the final section, is filial remembrance and gratitude. We have the parents we are given to have, and they are an indelible part of our identity.
A note on the illustration that Evan has chosen for this poem — it was used by the modern paperback publishers for the cover of Samuel Butler’s excellent novel “The Way of All Flesh” (1902, I think). That is one of the most important novels in English literature dealing with father-son relations, and how they can be decisive in the psychological crippling of a child, or in his coming to manhood. For a similar text (also English) on the same subject, see Edmund Gosse’s “Father and Son,” an autobiographical account of a deeply fraught parent-child relationship.
Amen a thousand times. “I hope you know your memory will never fade.” Memory acts (not stands but moves) as bridge between past and future. Your kaddish, Brian, fades in actively, with memory present in multiple modes, as the ancient words fade out. The poem moves in and out like a sine wave. A sign as well as a sigh to be repeated. Poignant.