A Visit with My Bedridden Father
By Sharon A. Foley
It took two years to get permission to see my father. I begin to imagine my first words with him. Beautiful day and he will answer, Did you see the light ripple on the stone wall? But it rains on my first visit. I say, I wish the rain would stop. And he replies, It always has. He’s wearing a blue johnny my mother made from one of his old shirts. There is a cross above his bed, a big wooden one with metal Jesus, a touch of red paint on the wounds. Dad’s been carving oak into a bowl he has rubbed with linseed oil. My habit does not scrape his floor. My breasts are bridled by a blue gamp. I am Sister Mary Sharon now. It’s against the rules but for him I lift my veil to show wisps of my hair. I have come from the high-ceilinged cloister. In this tiny room he seems so small to me.
Sharon A. Foley’s poems have or will soon appear Paterson Literary Review, Speckled Trout Review, Solstice, South Florida Poetry Journal, and The Big Windows Review. She entered the Sisters of Mercy at age eighteen and lived with them as a nun for twenty-nine years. Ms. Foley is now a psychotherapist.
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12/19 / Poetry Reading with visiting poet-in-residence Kristen Renee Miller + Arsimmer McCoy / The Library at The Betsy-South Beach, Miami Beach, FL / Live and Live-Streamed on Instagram Live/Facebook Live at @swwimmiami / 7:30 pm EST / Free
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I don't know who to be angry with, what entity or person withheld permission for the speaker to visit her sick father. That ambiguity creates a tension in this touching poem that makes it even more spellbinding.