Anton

Anton,
you did so much for my family,
your faith never ceasing to light the way,
despite medical evidence of impeding fatality.

Those warnings about your mortality were spoken
in words that confused doctors had to eat
each time the hungry tumour weakened, and retreated,
deferring your end.

Hard though it may be
to believe that my daughter and me gave you a reason —
or that your deity gave you strength to cling to this life
for a little more time — yet I accept it as true.
I’ll never forget how you thanked us
when it was we who owed thanks to you.

I wish you could hear my good news;
I wish we could meet,
so that my daughter and me could speak
our humble words of gratitude,
but I fear it may be too late.
You ceased communicating with this ethereal web of words
at the point where her speed increased
along the road to health,
and, for selfishness’ sake, I fear what that may mean.

But for the sake of you,
may wherever you are
be the place where you wish to be,
and may the atheism my father forced into me
be cruel falsity,
at least for those of true goodness and certainty, such as you,
so that, should you finally have left this terrestial plain,
you shall be making heavenly music on a celestial piano,
accompanied by the sweet harps of angels,
while other great peacemakers
listen and appreciate,
in the high place
where you deserve to spend eternity.

Anton, you did so much for me,
for more than this crude poem can explain.
I will always think dearly of you,
and I hope that someday, somehow, we may meet again.

xxx

©Jane Paterson Basil