When my dad first got his diagnosis, and before he saw specialists, the doctor told him he may only have 6-8 weeks left. And of course he was sad, of course we were all devastated.

But just days later, even as we were scrambling to gather and prepare and plan for this awful thing ahead, my dad interrupted our planning to leave the room. He had an online Tlingit formline class to get to.

It was unimaginable to my dad that even his impending death would stop him from learning and gaining new skills.

He made a comment to me years ago that he knew he would never be a Master Tlingit Artist. He had re-started his artwork too late in life to reach the quality of skill he knew a Master Artist has, and he accepted he just wouldn’t get there. At the moment I thought it was sad, but he laughed. And he got back to practicing becoming a better artist.

I think I understand more now it’s because there would have been something he regretted doing with his time before he became a professional artist to be sad about not reaching that highest artistic level. And he had lived too many lives and professions with distinct excitement and passion to regret any of it. He was a true Tlingit “renaissance man,” and his decades as an Alaska State Trooper, his years in tourism and airlines, his time out on the ocean he felt so at home in, his random “retirement jobs” he hopped around in – he loved all of it.

As it happened, we had the gift of nine more months with my dad after his diagnosis. He filled them, as he always has, with curiosity and questions and pondering and knowledge-seeking. We made a great family trip to lands he always wanted to see overseas, and he pushed himself through tiredness and pain to attain just a few more facts, just a little bit more trivia.

When his foggy mind and weakening body didn’t allow for more hands-on education and practice, he watched movies and documentaries and asked us to look up questions that came to him. He would hop around YouTube, finding new stories and teachers and shared some of his favorites with us. He continued to explain music and paintings and what he loved – or didn’t love – about famous art, and little-known art.

He made a study of his own life’s end, what a body and mind does as it prepares, and shared his discoveries with us and urged me to share them online so others would know what this was like. He would ponder out loud how strange it was, this failing body, between jokes and tears.

His last moments of activity and energy and consciousness were spent experimenting and asking questions of his hospice bed and care, and having me record his journey to it.

My dad left many great legacies behind, of artwork, of heroism, of stories, and eye-rolling jokes. But I’m also proud that he fostered his kid’s sense of curiosity. He fostered the desire to always know more and try new things in each of us, and I’m proud to say my siblings and I are all strongly curious and constantly trying new things in our own way. He helped create lifelong learners.

I always have my own reading and writing challenges I put to myself, and in the year and half before my dad passed, I was pushing myself on my poetry. I have always loved poetry but felt the most uncomfortable of all my writing in sharing it. One of the challenges I had for many months was to write a poem every day, no matter what. And most of them, by a wide margin, were pretty awful.

But when my dad passed, and I couldn’t make myself work on anything else, I realized that daily practice and writer-muscle development was helping with the only kind of writing I really wanted to do – poetry.

For me, poetry is the only writing outlet that gets somewhat close to those confusing, tumbling, chaotic emotions that have no honest outlet in narrative writing. And poetry poured out of me in my dad’s absence.

Again, most of it wasn’t good. But it was honest. And the lessons of my dad, and my own professional practice, gave me a confidence that this was only a place to start. Someday it will be good, but in the moment, that’s none of my business.

This year I am pushing myself to share my poetry more. Or… at all, really.

I remember clearly telling my parents in kindergarten that I wanted to be a poet when I was grown up. And my parents, bless them, only ever encouraged me. Over the years my dad would share some of his favorite poems, and quote verses he had memorized since high school. Although my writing dreams grew into new areas I didn’t know were possible in kindergarten, the poet persisted, even hidden away in journals I would sometimes burn. My family – and my father in particular – have only ever supported that secret section of my heart.

So on the anniversary of his passing, I wanted to share, no matter my insecurity, a poem in honor of my dad. It may not be Master Artist level, but growing in my writing seems a good way to honor him too.

Living As You Lived

 By Vera Starbard

Are you chatting up Neil Armstrong, Dad?
Are you asking what he saw
And how he felt
Hurtling into the stars
Stopping short of what was possible
Galaxies ahead of what was
Moments before
Are you grilling him
With your ever-present youthful awe
I miss so much
So much
Is he excited by your excitement, Dad?

Are you savoring coffee with John Lennon, Dad?
Are you asking him what really happened
Creating beauty amidst chaos
Genius provoking genius
Are you comparing playlists with him
Scrolling through your favorite videos
Showing what he missed
What came after he was taken from us
So he can experience
Joy
So apparent
When you close your eyes and listen
Is he inspired by your inspiration?

Are you watching war movies with Lincoln, Dad?
Are you pausing the screen to hear
His great debates and petty disputes
Or do you both dialogue over the dialogue
For your own great debates on imperfect nations
And people in pain
Prodding progress
Is he made thoughtful by your thoughts?

Are you sitting in the clan house of our Ancestors, Dad?
Are you reveling in the mysteries
Stolen from us
With violence and apathy
Learning names
And histories
Taken from our tongues
And memories
Are you telling them about their grandchildren
What they have taken back
What you have taken back
Are they proud of you?

Are you trading dances with Topol, Dad?
Snacking on sharp cheddar with Powhatan
Painting beside Winslow Homer
Taking car rides with Chief Joseph
Drumming with Charlie Watts
Sailing with Captain Bligh
Poring over maps with Patton

Are you still learning, Dad?
Still passionate about the world
Loving humanity
Still pursuing knowledge
Longing for understanding
Hoping for wisdom
Seeking insight
And caution
From the great and flawed men of before
Are you still seeking to be
A good man
Are you still living as you lived, Dad?
Are you still living