To My Father

A Hallmark holiday, as if one needs
a staunch reminder of the role he played.
He is long gone, but memories, like weeds,
invade the well kempt garden that I've made
of my adulthood. Where would I be now
if not for poems that he taught me as a child?
Would freedom mean as much without the how?
I grew up free. Free of the loathed, reviled
regime that stole his youth, a Gulag camp.
How can one thank for every sunny day,
for a blue passport with a precious stamp,
a title that reads, simply, U.S.A.
For children that grew up without a fear.
A happy day for me. I shed a tear.