stranger with my face,
where have you been?
i realize in therapy today
that i do not know my father
can’t remember the color of his eyes
or his address,
but i still know what he used to drink
when i was a small boy,
and surely that counts for something
old crow grog,
bottle pushed far back enough
on top of the fridge that i
couldn’t reach
and i guess i should thank
him for that,
shouldn’t i?
but if that’s all i have to thank
my father for
whose dna i share half of,
then what’s the fucking point?
tell me how i find the poetry
in a father that abused me
and then abandoned me
this man that didn’t want me
when i still thought i was his daughter,
and really didn’t want me for a son
what do i do with that?
how do i make it stop hurting?
how much gauze must i pack into
this gaping and gangrenous wound that
my childhood left
before it stops bleeding for good?
i was a kid,
i was just a kid
that needed his father,
but that’s never been something
i was willing to beg for,
nor should i have to