fatherhood

Written by Ryan MulrooneyPhotography by Calder Sell Fatherhoodafter “Winter Fathers, 1963,” to Illumination I was asked to be patient with the pages,like the fathers of ‘63. My hollers had to comein Arial, though, reminding my own of legacies and new directions and suggesting love -a love that begins at 6 AM, like winter fathers do. We review pages while a timid gold previews the day, breathing against the Mendota shoreline as weemerge from top-rate poetry alive and alit.  I did not ask to be a winter father of perfect bindingand collage art. The mod podge adhered muse and hand-me-down expectations. Though fathers raise a new generation and hope they’ll learn and listen.I father through online and offline love reacts and writingpoems for strangers although no one has ever writtenone for me. And I review submissions at 1 AM while wondering how I can be as wonderful as the young. I have discovered that good fathers are not created,but made. They’re a patchwork of frustration, talent, and, most importantly, those who come with them. This semester I can run down the shoreline, buildingendurance for those who start the next heat, the nextissue. Winter fathers do not stand idly on the icy sideline, but remember those who make them feel like a poem, and someday that generation will finally write us one.