I awake to the creak of the floor above my bed
and the drifting smell of coffee, and my mind carries me backward;
it’s seven years ago, a Saturday, with my father moving before anyone else.
Moving, listing out the days work with his cracking hands
on the small notepad he always carries. He scribbles, glances,
nods solemnly, and returns to writing as I tread
quietly up the stairs, dressed in clothes for work
because we don’t sleep in, except on Sundays, when he doesn’t drink coffee.
“God made man to labor for his bread,” he always said,
sipping from the cracked cup, examining the notebook, and thinking.
I remember seven years ago when we never slept in, except for Sundays.
That is, until the morning father wrote a note
and not a list, leaving it beside his steaming cup
looking back through closing the door as I came up,
and moving solemnly on.
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