for Mike Jasper

Almost called you ‘dad’ for good

somewhere between the canonball that made me cry
– you came out of nowhere –
and the afternoon I fell asleep in the passenger seat
with my mouth sagging open, when you and Corey joked
about putting straw paper in it, which was just like you,
so I closed my lips and napped on.

The comfort grew as easily as exchanging one syllable
for another, first name into fatherhood.
I wanted to remember you with every blue Jeep Cherokee,
at first, the ones on the road, not flipped in a field.

But now your name I hold like red carnation petals,
and it grows and it fades and it leaves its scent
and I love you, loud but temporary.