Audrey Shafer
˗ homage to Ada Limón’s Before
Long legged and fifteen, I sit before
my mother, a silhouette in white winter light
before she says I have something to tell you
about your father
before she says he died
before she fell silent
and I, the quiet one, finally said
he killed himself, didn’t he
before guilt digs its crab claws
before the fatherless graduations
before hiking the long road to reach his age
before a cardboard box in my attic
houses all his chicken scratch writing
before I have an attic
before unmet grandchildren
and great grandchildren
if suicide were only final
and not re-lived, reminders ever blooming
as grey clouds swallow
the innocent before.
About the Author
Audrey Shafer, MD is Professor Emeritum of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine / Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System; founder, Stanford Medicine & the Muse Program, Stanford Center for Biomedical Ethics; founder, Biomedical Ethics and Medical Humanities Scholarly Concentration; co-founder of Pegasus Physician Writers, and co-founder of the new Stanford undergraduate minor in Medical Humanities. She is the author of The Mailbox, a children’s novel on posttraumatic stress disorder in veterans.