Six Forty-Two, Still

My father had a stopwatch

he kept on a nail.

Above the bikes, the garage wall,

a little brass detail

nobody touched.

He timed me once—one mile,

the yard in loops, the wet grass,

and his face the whole while

just watching the dial.

After: six forty-two.

Not bad, he said. Not good.

The numbers he ran through

were not about the running.

I know that now.

He hung the watch back on the nail

and we went inside, somehow

agreeing not to talk about it.

The lawn was dark and wet.

I thought about that number

for thirty years. I let

it sit inside my sternum

like a coin in a drain.

And then in the break room, Tuesday,

Janice said it plain—

six forty-two, my lunch break—

and I was out the door

before I understood

what I was walking for.

The watch is dead. Still hanging.

The number hasn't moved.

My father in the driveway,

his face not yet removed.