The man behind the photograph

He was very pleased that he’d followed her advice. The photograph turned out fine. Just the right angle and lighting, with the colouring and setting adding to the dignity. In the best magazine and newspapers too!

A few things had worried him though. He hadn’t altered his hairstyle. Martina, his dear wife, suggested that he should part his hair down the middle. The remembrance of that brought a chuckle bubbling up from his stomach. It felt so good that when the chuckle turned into a laugh, he let it out – at full rip. “Man, that was great!” he murmured, wiping his eyes and seeing his happy, relaxed face reflected in the mirror. He moved up closer and whispered confidentially to the mirror, “You should laugh more often, Reggie.” The imitation of his ‘special friend’ as she’d wiped the lipstick evidence from his cheek after a recent council meeting, was spot on.

As expected, the photograph didn’t please Martina at all. No middle parting of his hair. The shirt he wore was his favourite, not the one she had bought for him at the men’s outfitters her daddy frequented. But the tie, well the tie was the last straw. Martina was furious about that. She left town some weeks’ later – destination unknown.

Her daddy moved in with Gerald, from the men’s outfitters.

As the newly elected mayor, Reggie got together with his special friend to thank her for the recommendations she had made, with regards to the photograph. And for the tie. Yes, of course, the tie!

Dennis Crompton © 2000

I am a father now

I am a father now, I tell you, I was there …
feeling and sharing in a secondary way
something of the searing pains my dear wife felt that day.
*
It was interminably long for her
as slowly, push by gasping … crying … straining … push
those intermittent hot pulsating surges
stretched more her pelvic frame and cervix.
This, midst low caring murmurings of her doctor and the nurses
who came and checked and whispered
went … came back again … assisted
then left us for a while, mother- and father to-be.
*
And I, helpless and with deep concern did watch
I squeezed her hand and wiped her brow
and kissed her damp, untidy perspirated hair.
From time to time, staff came and went
in crisp clean antiseptic gowns
and in-between they peered and talked and peered some more
and she, submitted to all this invading hurt
as on her crumpled sheets she wrestled there.
*
At least that’s what I thought, imagined it must be for her
I had not realized she saw beyond the drawn-out anguish of her bed.
She knew her body must become a door to motherhood
paining life’s miracle to the light of day.
*
And as a father I can tell you now, it was most wondrous to
behold the moment when my daughter entranced forth,
her tiny body holding so much hope,
as her first blessed helpless human sounds my heart did touch.
*
I had not thought when first began the process to this did span,
that it would be as I experienced now, and I first kissed this babe
of ours upon her lovely, soft and tender brow.
*
And even now, these many years gone by
my arms do feel again in memories treasured times,
her so small body snuggled warm against my chest.
And ‘membering when I first did look upon her face,
I feel those unashamed tears again spill from my eyes.
*
I am her father still, my wife and Love’s best gift,
and will they ever know what word means to me?
I, am a father now.
*
© Dennis Crompton 1994

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