Before Dawn’s Promise

Tomorrow, I’ll vanish like morning fog,

leaving behind more than empty spaces —

a father’s love wrapped in paper promises,

receipts of care in place of presence.

I’ll fund your dreams in instalments:

school fees tucked into envelopes,

dance classes paid in advance,

karate lessons scheduled through seasons.

Each payment a morse code of devotion,

tapping out “I love you” in bank transfers.

I’ll order the safest cars to cradle you,

guide you through library doors from afar,

point to shelves where novelists wait,

where Ronald Dahl you’ll read alone.

You’ll lack nothing but my shadow —

no missed meals, no unpaid bills,

just missed bedtime stories,

just blank spaces in birthday photos,

just questions about my favourite colour

that no one can answer.

When anger finds you,

when you search old albums

for traces of my smile beside yours,

remember: you never lost what was there,

for I was already gone

before you knew to miss me.

This is love’s arithmetic:

subtraction before addition,

absence making room for growth.

For it’s harder, daughters and son,

to lose what you once held

than to live without what never was.

You may not have a father’s hand to hold,

but you’ll have everything else instead —

a future built on distance,

where dinner’s warmth matters more

than who sits at the table,

where every payment is a promise kept,

where love is measured not in the presence

but in provision.

And somewhere in that future,

you’ll understand why I chose

to be the ghost who funded dreams

rather than the father who failed them.