There comes a day for fathers.
Earned or not earned,
to know what you are,
or can become,
when a child looks at you
and calls you Daddy or Dad or Father.
A page is opened
upon which a legacy will be written,
and your heart will say,
the way I live will be remembered,
and the way I die
will be mourned or forgotten.
It will matter to a son or daughter
how that happens.
If I do not speak
my children will not hear me.
If I do not love
my name will be meaningless.
If I do not grow,
I can not teach,
and my children will follow someone else.
If I am not gentle,
there will be no hand
to ease the injuries of living.
If I am not patient,
the door to my longing will remain unopened.
If I do not share my time,
my generosity will be meaningless.
As a father I must grow up again
with each of my children,
and find the place where they stand,
where they live.
I must accept their pain as my own,
their achievements as theirs,
to be praised.
Being a father is to show them
my failures as well as successes,
and understand that virtue
is earned each day of your life.
Patience must be the power
of a wise humility,
and listening
must be part of your children’s conversation.
And truth of a father
is to learn after being a boy,
the youthful randomness of sex,
that vices that accumulate by design
or accident,
must be handled with charity and discarded.
That once a father you will be, ready or not,
a father who remembers his own
with joy or regret, a gift,
for a work in progress in yourself.