Seven
I am seven when my brother tells me
Santa is not real.
This is not news to me.
I cry although I always knew
to let adults lie.
Especially, if it means
we can fake our smiles
for a family photo
to hang on
everyone’s perfect fridge.
Hard-scrabble.
Like lettuce grown in rocks
Just to get kilt-down
And eaten.
Hard-scrabble,
Like a baby drinking Mountain Dew
Right in front of Diane Sawyer,
Daring her to say a word.
Hard-scrabble.
Like lungs that grow hard and black
As the coal in the mountains
They come from
Bone of my bone,
Flesh of my flesh.
Death becomes us
As we become it.
It isn’t morbid.
Don’t be sad.
It’s just the way
of things.
Crayon Rubbing
Today our teacher showed us
something magical. If you lay
your paper over some coins,
and rub a crayon over them,
their image will appear
on the paper. I’m using
“chestnut” for Lincoln.
I asked Missy Johnson
which color I should use
for Jefferson. She just
stuck her tongue out at me.
Dad
The first person I opened my eyes too.
Breathtaking
Pulled the plastic out of my throat when I was one and my face turned blue.
Truth
How could I believe anyone could love me, correction, my own father.
Reality
Yes, he left.
Others
Thank you, joke about the displaced parent who’s home is in my heart but was suddenly evicted.
Arrival
He comes back for the slightest, he wants money.
Dismissal
He leaves, retreats to number two along with an Old friend, drugs.
Family
He has a new one.
Me
Stuck in the past of a traumatic memory tweaked to my worst weakness and debilitating fears.
Memory
Driving, dad…are you okay? Are you awake? Hey! You’re driving don’t fall asleep!
Tight
Nervous, he’s nodding off, stop drowning me in responsibilities of making sure you’re breathing at age six.
Overdose
Everyone visited him but me.
Grief
For the father I once had, now gone, but so desperately needed.
Help
I can’t see, my vision is blurred.
Tears
Oh I’m sorry I couldn’t notice over my racing thoughts.
Call
The phone rings I jump at the thought that THIS is the call.
Why
Why me?
Others
If not me it’d be others.
Care
I don’t.
Hurt
I wish it was someone else not me, it’s not fair, I can’t breathe because of you.
Suffocated
I wish I was in the front seat of your truck, music blaring, cigarette in your mouth.
Maybe
Impossible, you, sober? what the hell is this, a joke?
Go
It will be easier.
No
I lied come back.
Heartbreak
Father, my first heartbreak, leaving his child in excruciating pain.
Goodbye
father please don’t come back in the end if you weren’t there from the start.
Wait
Is that you?
Money
I understand. Is that all you want? Here’s twenty dollars. Oh you’re leaving already? Oh ok see ya.
Answer
“Your call has been forwarded to an automated voice messaging system. At the tone, please record your message.”
Okay
I’m fine, no really I am it happens all the time.
Buried
As I sink continuously faster by the second, who will save me? Because I’m sure as hell it won’t be my father. I save myself, clinging onto the walls of hurt and angst with my fingers. Slowly slipping, my fingernails break.
Fall
I tumble more and more with each breath I feel my eyes roll back into my head unable to see.
Stuck
Forever in this state of abandonment and exile I tend to fill my lungs with air unable to feel a goddamn thing.
