🤍today would have been...

🇪🇪

my grandfather!

…My maternal grandfather Arved Viirlaid’s 105th birthday! (Instead of calling him “grandpa”, my sister and I always called him “Taadi.”) As I mentioned in my last post “🐺how i’ve stayed committed to my habits!,” part of my morning routine has been reading his poetry that’s been translated from Estonian to English. When he was alive, I didn’t speak much Estonian, and he didn’t speak much English, but I always felt a connection to him as my family encouraged me to follow in his footsteps as a writer. That, and if I had been born male I’m told I would have been given his name!

What’s interesting is that even though he passed away in 2015, now that I’m reading his writing as an adult, I feel closer to him than ever- which makes me so grateful for the written word! I’ve always felt like reading poetry or books is so intimate, because writers usually write alone, letting their most vulnerable thoughts fall onto the page…and then the reader is often reading alone as well, perhaps in bed or another cozy nook…two separate people perhaps years (or centuries!) apart, having a private, deep connection to one another, reminding us that we have more in common with each other than we may think❤️.

I think, today of all days, it would be fitting to share a poem I wrote a during the pandemic about a girl and her grandfather…so thank you, dear readers, for reading it if you choose to, and having this intimate connection with me🥰!

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source

In The Dark


I.

we rested on our backs,
absorbing what was left
of the day’s sun
through the rock
at the top
of a hill
on salt spring island.
the balmy pinks had melted
into a velvety indigo,
and you took your large wrinkled hand,
skin thick
from a hard day’s work
a hard many years
into my young palm,
smooth from a summer of sand and pacific waters.
you pointed out aquila, cygnus, and lyra,
among constellations i could never remember.
i listened to your soft, lulling legends
of greek memories in the sky.
your lores would end at the moon,
lit by the biggest star
in our snowy galaxy.
do you see the face in its black seas?
your voice a doughy bed
that man is me,
your company in the dark.


II.

years passed
the coast salish earth,
made of ancient
granite
and quartz
remained
protecting
our footsteps.
animals lent us
their woods,
oaks and firs guided
a path,
so that
after we climbed
at dusk
grand father
and daughter
could descend like
waddling raccoons
in shadows,
cautious
but unscathed.


III.

my hand
is now folding
with its own timelines...
it’s spring
and the deer
have been eyeing your cabin
with their fawn
in the back field
noting
your absence
while i
have been isolating
with your
syrupy
and savory
plants,

waiting
for you to come home.

 

soon.

maybe.


IV.

tonight
through telephone
wires
i learned a
hollow sickness
brawny sickness
cryptic sickness
its only acquaintance
machines
during visitation hours

won.

grey
pallid
yellow
walls
greeted you
at your final minute.

did you know
i wanted
to be there
as it stole
your last breath
for itself?
did you know
how i
wished
to warm
your hand,
as you
had warmed mine,
the blood
from your
heart
pumping
into
my own
through your fingertips?

blood that
now,
i guess
has turned cold.


V.

i run out the door
and into the trees
upupup the small mountain
until i

drop

to my back
in the old clearing
on the old rock
in our old place.
i feel the absence
of your touch
as i grasp
for any
lingering
sun
in the ground.
my chest
is heaving.
i open
my eyes.

a storm of stars

welcomes me

and in the middle

is the moon

is you

my company

in the dark.

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another photo of my grandfather, this time with the books he wrote - many were published in various languages!

❤️Happy birthday, Taadi! Your love of nature helped inspired this poem❤️.

xo,

kaja