My pa taught me

putang ina

and wow,

the suddenness

of joy, the stun

of beauty:
how life is taken best

when taken by surprise.
He taught me

the jangle of keys at night

meant he was home

the brown bag in his hand

plump with the promise

of dumplings or sweetbreads
that a week of work meant

Saturdays tasted sweeter

and Sundays blazed brighter.
He taught me

the three meanings of shuffle

two good

one sad:
the riffled peacock tails

of playing cards

those snappy rainbows

of aces and jacks;

the effortless astronomy

of boogeying with mama
as she twirled and spun

and whirled and hummed

around the steady axis

of his smile, her feet

approximating the twinkle

of stars, his own gliding

sliding in that inch by inch

unruffled shuffle to

syncopated time.
Oh my papa taught me:

he taught me comics

he taught me words.
Areglado? he would always ask.

Agreglado! I would reply.
And as time passed

he taught me

how to wade

through boilerplates and contracts

how the intricate constructions

of syntax and phrase

restrain the larceny of men

in ways no poems can.
How he loves life my father;

oh how he loves the game.
And that man over there

stooped and shuffling

so gingerly, so carefully

so daunted by the treachery

of cracks in the floor

of unexpected steps,

shuffling more carefully

than he ever shuffled cards

shuffling in the grip

of gravity and time

that’s the man who taught me

the slow sad shuffle

of loving someone for life.