.

Visiting our grandchildren I thought about my father.

He raised his hands. I touched them. Our last contact.

Flesh from flesh, bone from bone. What of us continues?

I saw my grandson’s name on a dish. My father, me, my son,

my grandchild. The same surname. But his hands are not here –

his bone, his flesh – no atoms of his nature exist.

A poem I wrote for my granddaughter when she was born:

A life appears

He determines the number of the stars

and calls them each by name

.

Silken linen purple are her vestment O Lord.

In the sun he has placed his tabernacle.

You have freed me, Lord, from the mouth of the lion.

Alleluia.

.

Medieval Latin fragment: ‘Bone now from my bones…’

blog.lib.utah.edu/medieval-latin-hymn-fragment-bone-now-from-my-bones/