There are a thousand reasons
why I love him.
Or just this one.
The only thing you need to know
about your father
is this day.
An old woman
who couldn’t find her car
and your father,
who passed you to me
so he could walk the streets with her,
eventually driving her in our car
where they found her own
way on the other side of the park.
“She never would have found it,”
was all he said
as we drove to the dinner party
only a little bit late
while I roped the memory
around my heart,
practicing how I would tell you about it
every few years or so,
this little kindness
that explained so much.