Today would have been his 92nd birthday. My #1 fan and the man I referred to as me Da left this world on April 9th surrounded by his 4 children and one son-in-law. It was a beautiful and as much as possible, easy death. He sang along to Frank Sinatra’s My Way hours before his last breath. I have been so very, so, so very blessed.
It was a bit of an effort but he made it to my gig at The Capitol Bar on March 30th. 10 days later he was gone. It has been a while since my last post and this is why. I am slowly working on the song I plan to record but all of this thing called life and death has taken my attention, my heart and my ability to do much else.
I want to share the performance of the song I wrote about him and his last chapter. It was soon after his cancer diagnosis that I wrote it. We’d had the most matter of fact conversation of what seemed to be his sooner rather than later death when in fact it was about 11 months before that would come to pass. I sang the song last August at The Song School on the Wildflower stage and then put it away. It didn’t seem right to play it out in the town where he was known. So it was there, at song school, where I got to sing this song called Empty Room.
Que sera sera is what he said
Looking at me from a hospital bed
I am scared about what comes next
But maybe, maybe, I’m up for the test
Heavy lifting, lives are shifting
Flowers in full bloom
He’s on the waitlist, Not yet weightless
The fair chance of an empty room
He’s lived a long, a long life
at the end of the day he’ll follow his wife
To have stayed this long he does not regret
A full house of cards built on a bet
Heavy lifting, lives are shifting
Flowers in full bloom
He’s on the waitlist, Not yet weightless
The vagueness of an empty room
He promised, he promised a sign
A corner of a smile and I knew it was time
He said, I’m ready for the spirit in the sky
Or whatever you find after goodbye
Heavy lifting, lives are shifting
Flowers in full bloom
He’s on the waitlist, Not yet weightless
The stillness of an empty room
Ooh, ooh, ooh, hmm, mmm
Heavy lifting, lives are shifting
Flowers in full bloom
There’s no more waitlist, finally weightless
I’m still in this, his empty room
I’ll leave you with this poem I wrote in a *poetry through grief* workshop with the amazing poet, Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer last week.
Today, the weight of grief is muddy, cloudy and wet
It feels like an extra organ in my chest,
closer to my solar plexus
It comes up to my eyes in sobs and cries then
Goes back down to settle in for the night
It shifts my center of gravity and catches me off guard
I know it is there because he is not here
Even though I truly believe he isn’t ever far
From my heart, closer to me than the stars
Today the weight of grief is sticky and makes me want to trip
I bring my gaze to the floor because I am sure
I do not want to fall into the abyss
the black hole of all of this
the place where grief lives
clouding my senses until I can feel it
Today grief feels like a runaway train
Barreling down the hillside threatening the terrain
The manicured lawns screeching in pain
Each blade of grass that thought it was safe
Stands alone now without a smile on its face
Orphaned, it knows of loss and love’s heartache
I am my solar plexus and the stars and the abyss
I am the blade of grass, I am all of this
This might be longer than a song but it’s mine to sing. Thanks for listening, TerriSunflower
Terri, I'm sorry to hear that Tom is out of sight. How lovely to have had such a fan in a father.
What a most beautiful song about your father. A wonderful way to honor him.