How to resolve AdBlock issue? - Kwame Dawes
- Posted On
American Life in Poetry: Elegy with Steam
William Fargason’s “Elegy with Steam” never refers to his father’s death, but to the manner in which death represents a movement through veils of existence.
Fargason’s memory of fatherly care becomes a portal that allows him to hear his father’s voice “on the other side,” through the veil of a warm washcloth.
Elegy with Steam
By William Fargason
When I was sick with a head cold, my head
full of pressure, my father would soak a washcloth
in hot water, then ball it up, wring it out. He would
open it above my head, then place it against
my face like a second skin, the light around me
disappearing entirely except through the spaces
between the stitching. I would inhale the steam
in that darkness, hearing his voice on the other side,
otherwise almost devoid of any other bodily sense
but the warmth and depth of his voice, as if
I had already died and was on the other side
of life waiting for the sickness to lift, but I wasn’t.
I was still on this earth, the washcloth going cold
on my face, my body still sick, and my father still
there when I opened my eyes, as he always was,
there to give me warmth before going cold again.
American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited manuscripts. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2022 by William Fargason, “Elegy with Steam” from The Maine Review, January 20, 2022 Poem reprinted by permission of the author and the publisher. Introduction copyright ©2022 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Kwame Dawes, is George W. Holmes Professor of English and Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner at the University of Nebraska.
