My Father's Poems: May 22, 2022

Daily Diary, Day 670:

First off, thanks for all of your lovely responses to my wedding anniversary post. They really made the day even more special. Since Sundays are the day I have decided to post poems by my father, I thought about how much my own parents were the model for me of a successful marriage of equals who encouraged me, their child, to be whatever she wished to be. Needless-to-say, this has always been my favorite poem. In addition, one of you asked to know more about my father—so at the end there is a biography he attached to one of his chapbooks of poems.

LOU

From your cradle years
until you were woman
we came at night to watch you sleep,
willed you waken
to remark our trespass.

In time lapse beauty
you grew before our eyes,
in cell dividing sequence,
in opening, expanding, transformations,
each one more receptive and complex,

while hard within
you formed a sharp
resolve to be away.

We are not the earth,
but you did moon within our holding force
for half your present life.
Without spark or noise
you built inertia to spin away.

Now,
you tumble free.

You have come back from time to time
to share with us your lover
to stand with me by your mother's bed
while she got well
and to celebrate our present company.

JOSEPH H. LOCKE was born and raised in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania. He attended the University of Pittsburgh, where, after serving in World War II, he completed his BA. He then obtained an MA in social work from Michigan State University.  His career was with U.S. Steel Corporation, and after his retirement he taught business sociology for City College. His first marriage was to Jane Townsend Locke, with whom he had a daughter, Mary Louisa Locke. During this marriage, along with his wife, he was active in the civil rights movement and Common Cause. He and his wife Jane also researched and wrote, Locke Art Glass: A Guide for Collectors.

In retirement Joseph began a long career as a serious poet, writing some of his best work as a member of the Poets of the Palm Beaches, in Florida. His publication credits include The Lyric, The Christian Scientist Monitor, Backspace Magazine, The North Country Anvil, and The Summer Magazine. After his first wife died, Joseph married Ruth Clark, who is also a poet and a musician.