What we see when we cannot see

This is a poem about my experience of going to see an exhibition of visual art with my Dad. His eyesight is enormously compromised as a result of macular degeneration, which means he has a different way of engaging with pictures than he used to. He has a different way of engaging with the world than I do, but that has kind of always been the case. Still, each of these shared experiences we have is beyond precious to me

Going through the gallery and keeping an eye on him, watching for trip hazards, finding banisters and counting steps is strange for us both. Strange is a weak word, but it works. He gets up close to see what he can and he is enormously enthusiastic about the creativity, the quality, the joy of art’s existence and his own ability to appreciate it, whatever obstacles there may be for him.

My Dad has his ways. I’ve not always felt understood by him. Maybe, if he’d ever thought about it – not sure if he has – he might not always have felt understood by me. But there’s more to life than that. And I love him.

After a trip to the gallery together

I see mirages, he says,
A desert before him
Walking over dunes in sand-heavy steps
Collecting what he finds,
Scraps and soft edges

And there is no turning back now
The fragments assembling out
Of memory and mirage
Mine too; a sudden beacon truth –
How it always was, a love
So desperate to please, to impress
To be seen

It’s a mirage, Dad
Just a mirage
Your brain trying to make sense 
Of the pieces your eyes
Can gather

And I walk with him
Counting off steps and 
Holding his arm,
Some silent signal
I can’t know if he can see
To let him understand
He is still an oasis for me