Opportunity, missed...

I walked today along the lane

where once I met my estranged father.

What had come between us…?

oh, a trifling thing of nought,

creating doubt, anger and separation,

and neither he nor I

could meet each other’s eye.

*

So, we passed by, both heaving

sad and sorrowful sighs…

back then.

*

Oft since I’ve longed to walk that lane

and meet again my lonely aged father.

Nothing would come between us…

I’ll give my oath on that.

*

Alas! Too late! We had our chance,

though lane recalled that sad, sad passing,

time and the grave have done their sealing work.

*

Gone that unhappy and despondent figure,

forever gone the time

to make amends.

*

Dennis Crompton © 1995

(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)

 

In March 1954, I wrote a letter to my father saying that I’d joined the Royal New Zealand Air Force and would leave England in a few week’s time. We did meet and we made our peace. We wrote many letters to each other before he died a few years later.