Monday, June 16, 2014

Mark Halliday: "Summer Planning"















My father and I on the sofa talked about summer plans,
would he drive from New York to Ohio?
It seemed doubtful (he was eighty-six)
and he said We'll see what comes to pass.
For a minute we were silent.
He said, That's an interesting idiom, isn't it.
To come to pass. "It came to pass."
There's a feeling of both coming and going
at the same time.
Yeah, I said. I wondered what movie we might see.
He said, It's quite different to say "It happened"—
that sounds like a stop, like a fixed point.
But "It came to pass"—there's almost a feeling of
"It came in order to pass."
Yeah, I said, that's right.
He said, You get a sense of the transience of everything.
Yes, I said.
Cleo the black cat lay snoozing across my father's legs.
My father stroked her gently.
I finished my raspberry iced tea.



"Summer Planning" by Mark Halliday, from Jab. © University of Chicago Press, 2002.  

Art credit: Detail from untitled photograph by kimeveruss. 



1 comment :

  1. Time comes to pass--I'm now understanding that phrase in a whole new way.

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