I discovered this poignant short film on a friend's timeline on Facebook. It's by Michaël Dudok de Wit, a Dutch animator, director and illustrator, and it won an Academy Award in 2000. I was so moved by it that I wrote an inspired poem:
Against the sturdiness of trees is where
She leans her wish to never say ‘goodbye.’
The same roadway without a single car
Pays homage to the goings-on of life –
As simple and enduring as the grass,
Yet as evolving as that life itself.
That sameness of locale is anchoring
For hope, eternal as a girl who looks
– And always stops to look, despite the rain,
The snow, the wind, the calendar of loss –
For any sign of him, the sanctity
That proves that humankind is purposeful.
The shimmer from a sheet of melted snow.
The stiff headwind that tangle whips her hair.
The cold made meaningless by people whose
Lives go on, undeterred and simplified
As bicycles and overcoats and games.
The dry seabed is metaphor for skin.
The walk at dusk on sand is not tireless.
The boat marooned, part sunk into seabed,
Is welcoming when she becomes so tired
That she can only seek a dreamless sleep.
To fall atop the hill, then fall again.
In the interiors of enduring love,
She finds reversals of her age and loss –
Her heart jumps, startles to such countless beats.
His, too. She pauses, as he waits. She runs,
As seconds are an odd of fast and slow –
More like a scurry – to his inch – then stop.
That they will now believe the truth in this –
That they, whom circumstance may separate,
Are never separated for too long.
Father and Daughter © Ron Villejo
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