This is Poetry Moment on WPSU – a weekly program featuring the work of contemporary Pennsylvania poets. Your host is poet and author Marjorie Maddox, a 2023 Monson Arts Fellow, author of more than 20 books, and Professor Emerita of English and Creative Writing at the Lock Haven campus of Commonwealth University.
Welcome to Poetry Moment. I’m Marjorie Maddox
Today is All Souls' Day, a time set aside in Catholic traditions for commemorating the faithful departed. In Mexico, All Souls' Day is part of Day of the Dead festivities. In today's poem, "Double Vision," David Livewell honors his father-in-law by celebrating common characteristics with the poet's son. Addressing his child, Livewell states, "In you we have a father and a son: / His past, your future merging into one."
David Livewell was reared in North Philadelphia, where many of his poems are set. He won the T.S. Eliot Poetry Prize for his last book, "Shackamaxon." His poems have appeared in The Hudson Review, The Threepenny Review, Poetry, The Hopkins Review, and other journals. He received a 2025 fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. A new book of poems, "Pass and Stow," is just out from Paul Dry Books.
Sometimes, we glimpse not only ourselves in our children but also departed family members. Concerning today's poem, David Livewell explains, "It is fascinating to see how genes pass along physical traits from one generation to another, but it is even more mysterious to witness how tastes and talents can be transferred to descendants one may never meet in the flesh. My father-in-law, if he had lived just a few more years, would have enjoyed my son so much, and they would have watched countless Phillies games together."
Here’s "Double Vision," by David Livewell, a poem dedicated to his son, Liam, at 15.
Double Vision
-for Liam at 15
I once believed the dead could not come back.
I prayed to them. I asked the Ouija board
Questions about eternal love. Ignored,
I visited their graves. But, with a lack
Of certitude, I spoke no more of ghosts
When I became your Dad. Yet your form flaunts
Your Grandpop’s genes. I see the way he haunts
Your yawn, your stare, and, when your figure coasts
Across home plate, I see the way he dipped
In his old Cadillac. He smiles through you.
I watch his hair and feel his hand and wrist.
He shares your baseball games but stays tight-lipped,
Echoes the younger man he was, a view-
Point sent with love to a boy greatly missed.
In you we have a father and a son:
His past, your future merging into one.
(Reprinted with permission from Pass and Stow, Paul Dry Books, 2026.)
Listen for Poetry Moment with Marjorie Maddox, Mondays during Morning Edition and All Things Considered on WPSU. You can view more episodes at wpsu.org/poetrymoment.
Our theme music is by Eric Ian Farmer.
