The Final Elegy for My Father
Terrence Eugene Knott, 1934-2026
I killed off some version of you in my writing
so many times when you were alive, it seemed inevitable
I would be the only one with you when you actually died.
In all the hundreds—maybe even thousands—
of sentences I devoted over the years to your death,
I never once allowed myself to imagine
the softness of your eyelids beneath my fingertips.
*
Rothko on Art
Always remember to protect your painting hand.
The most perfectly defined lines I ever created were
the three that crisscrossed the canvas of my left wrist.
*
Rothko’s Ghost
I woke up in this new life not knowing whether I had ended up in Heaven or Hell. All I do know is that the house I now haunt has no doors, and every window is like one of my paintings, opaque yet diaphanous, something to be stared into not through.
*
Kip Knott’s most recent book of poetry, Rothko’s Gospels, is available from tiny wren publishing. You can follow him on Instagram at @kip.knott.
The last line of your elegy–unexpectedly powerful. Thank you.
Not a wasted word. terrific!
That eyelid line is just exceptional.