How Not to Stop / Gabeba Baderoon

Pa came to collect us from school 
in his white Valiant, the stern drive home. 
Pa sat at the head of the table, 
not talking at supper. 
Pa stood in the driveway 
with his back to us, throwing 
seed into the wind with quick slings 
of the hand, drawing the pigeons 
as though he'd called them. 
Pa carved his own domino set; 
on weekend games sly as chess, slapped 
the final piece on the wood table. 
Pa drove us home past the house 
he built, from which his family was removed 
in 1968, never looking again 
in its direction. 
Pa bought his leaf tea and hard cheddar 
from Queen Bess supermarket and bread 
at Protea bakery, the same shops 
down the street from their old house. 
Pa rehearsed how not to stop, not to get out 
and walk to the front door he had made.