I read The Sun as I eat my breakfast — a recent, conscious departure from the morning news. When I saw the February 2022 table of contents, I turned immediately to Jane Hilberry’s poem “My Father’s Messages Erased from My Answering Machine.” My mother’s messages were erased, too, a year after she died. I was devastated. Eight years later I feel her presence every day. Still, I had forgotten how much I miss her voice, sharing her seemingly inconsequential, but always sweet, musings. I see now that none of them was inconsequential.
I wept with sadness and joy this morning, thinking about Hilberry’s father: how the tragic death of his daughter decades before, juxtaposed with his lifelong habit of wonder and awe, illustrates one soul’s capacity for love.