Kim Gewin

One Day
          For Dad (1929-2000)
 
One of the Gods gave me a bent key.
After full moon, my faith gradually dying.
I tried it on the one lock to open one God.

The God has refused to bless the bent key
My father challenged, “You don’t believe enough, that’s why!”
“Do you?”  I yelled hammering the bent key straight.
The sharp metal hurt. My fingertips bled.

My father had a stroke the day
the straight key got stuck in one God.
In three stubborn days and three wakeful nights I heard
the God screaming beyond the one lock.

I’ve died enough since then to love the bent key.

 

Kim Gewin. Saigon born. Grew up during the war. Moved to the U.S. in 1994 with her parents and seven brothers and sisters. At Broward Community College, she met Prof. David Plumb who has guided her to writing. Her poems first published in Outlaw Poetry Network.