And I dreamed he was lying flat
in a boat, and I had placed him there.
I was not remembering the past.
I felt no rancor, nor any fellow feeling,
just a calm finality.
It was evening, and not much
could be seen but the shoreline,
the shape of the canoe-like vessel,
and shadowy branches
like wings of large birds
surrounding his body.
I do not know if he was asleep, or drunk,
or dead, the difference not important
to the moment—just that he was quiet, still.
I bent over the boat and shoved,
and it moved into the water with almost
no sound, and out to the calm sea.
His body looked peaceful, as if finally finding
the place he was always meant to be.
Or perhaps my own self, unseen,
moved into the darkness.
Sandra Vrana grew up in a western Pennsylvania coal mining town where her father was a coal miner from the age of twelve. She has a PhD in Literature and Cultural Criticism from Indiana University of Pennsylvania. A retired Professor of Literature and Writing, she taught classes for decades at Alderson Broaddus University in Philippi, West Virginia.