Erleichda

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
—Albert Einstein

It’s time, child, to talk about the feathers —
how they came and what they meant.

Some of this you know already: That it began
after your Grampa died, the season of molting,

and how they’d turn up every time I left the house,
on sidewalks and greenways or caught in bushes.

I’m sure you remember vases full of them —
crow and owl, cardinal and jay, others I couldn’t identify.

Mostly single specimens, except for the mourning doves.
Those always came in threes.

Pictures counted too — T-shirts and tattoos,
street art, laptop decals at the coffee shop.

Each one a pause, a friendly wave, a gentle laying-on
of an unseen hand. Of course there’s the easy association

with angels, but also the wry passing of quills
between writers — my father to me.

The joke really got rich when I learned about the feather of Ma’at,
counterweight on the scales Osiris used to judge the dead,

how a good death meant the heart was lighter than the feather —
unburdened by resentment, guilt, grief.

Richer still when I remembered a book he gave me back in college —
a goofy novel called Jitterbug Perfume (maybe you’ll read it someday).

It had one of those scenes that sticks with you, where the spirit
of one character leaves a note for her beloved —

the secret of life traced in dust on a windowsill, a made-up word
in a made-up language that meant “lighten up.”

This is extra funny because one of Dad’s better-known
books is called Getting Serious.

Like, who the hell was he to be floating that kind of advice,
even if it was the thing I most needed to hear?

All right, you say, but what does this have to do with now,
with me?

Obviously, I am in no position to promise anything,
but keep watch just the same,

and remember that a pound of feathers is no less
than a pound of gold,

and that one way to know something is poetry
is if it’s talking about at least two things at once.