When Finish Lines Become The Next Start Line
We mark our thresholds with the flat of a hand —
talk to the hand, we say,
as if the palm itself could mediate between what was
and what comes next.
One son held his palm to the truck window
As I was leaving.
It said goodbye to everything prior —
Big maple leaves riding rivers of rainwater,
Card houses and Lincoln Logs,
Raffi and banana phones,
Yu-Gi-Oh! battles, Scouts, prom dates,
Sailing over the triple jump pit straight into my camera lens,
College campus lunches where we fixed the world.
His palm pressed to glass,
A window fogged with leaving.
He on one side. Me on the other.
A goodbye to the past, yes —
But also a start line into the future.
He exploding into the wide lane
Of untested adulting.
Me in the starting blocks of a life without him.
I willed it away, resisted it, hated it—
But still had to run it.
One son entered his first marathon chute
Just as I entered the chute for the half —
Two races finishing side by side.
A coincidence the universe must have arranged —
His legs still fresh after twenty-six miles,
Mine asking for mercy after only thirteen,
And yet we hit our finish lines at the same time.
My chest swelled when I saw him there.
I was so fucking proud of him —
For what he had finished.
His hand came up.
Meeting mine in a high five.
Finish lines can be funny that way —
We cross thinking, It's done!
When it's not.
Because we weren't finished
But had just begun...something.
Their father knew this.
He drove us all to our start lines,
Patient at the wheel,
Watching us go — watching us grow
Until the morning we became
The ones at the wheel,
Driving him to his ‘finish’ line.
And at the last breath,
My palm against his chest —
Saying goodbye,
But he just beginning...something.
