In the dragonfly stillness I watch six long legs graceful, cool stream just tense enough to support their alien progression. He watches me dandelion eyes wild and short lived. "You will be an amazing woman." He whispers I watch he watches frozen golden in a moment of 'will be'. This too is a piece.
this is not a memory this is today this moment this twist and choke the sorrow I have evaded for so long trembling in the bushes as it passed today I heard it coming and I jumped up and said 'it's time' and it didn't falter like I'd hoped it would it didn't slow it smiled a toothy grin and squared its shoulders and I was so small and I was so sure so here i am now, under its weight unable to breathe unable to scream and feeling it familiar I've been here before under a different monster and he couldn't kill me either
Our pilgrimage. Saturday morning three blocks in the sunshine birds in my hair tangled joy and adventure Our ritual. Outside, clutching thirty cents in dirty hands, I chose Sunkist... Chocola... 7up... Inside, clutching habit and familiarity, he chose white can... black letters... BEER offerings made prayers complete we moved to our return This day he lurched to a stopping, intent and bearded change rattling dully in the machine newspapers shook, dancing in the breeze the tabernacle opened with a scream Carefully lifting the inky smelling pile presenting it to the sky he murmured "news should be free" my small voice, orange lipped and soft "news should be free" Genuflecting, he knelt, placing the pile at the foot of the soda machine an offering to the Chocola gods a sacrifice to the Liquor Barn Sacrament complete, we turned home Our worship The church of beverages The holy place of free news The sacred promise of soda This too is a part.
warm rich clouds sunlight rot and dust stirring motes clogging mouth and nose tiny lungs ache it smells like a kind of home still not 'home' a kind of home a place I wanted to belong a place I wanted to feel safe I smelled it on men and felt longing I smelled it on myself and felt whole familiar, like sassafras and grandma cigarettes and dad smothered by the warm held by the scent as his arms never would and still it's vinyl and stinking cloying and full and still in line at the store organic yogurt in hand I smell it and feel a stranger in this life my eyes scan for the man who carries home on his jacket how do I love a man who smells of grapefruit and lavender how do I love myself who smells of oatmeal and mint how do I love without the scent of a slow dying
I know the correct cucumber to salt ratio 1:2 small slices quick shakes my dad taught me through smoke and distance as he drank himself to death as he smoked himself to rot sitting hard on the irony of his lesson in moderation I feel a begrudging gratitude I learned to properly eat cucumber on a warm summer night that happiness can be simple and even bitter that one shake too many does irreparable damage I never knew an adult to be so fragile I never knew how to look at him instead of the cucumber slices he passed I wonder now if he felt the drink that killed him as I felt the third shake of salt that ruined everything
‘Mind my cigarette!’ dangerous hugs dodging embers quiet curses impatient sighs hot shame buffalo child turning a hug into a catastrophe his skulking frustration his lurking guilt my wilting embarrassment his need to smoke my need to be held my place in the queue behind the cigarettes behind the beer behind his shame buffalo man turning a child into a catastrophe it is no wonder then years later ... when I so slowly wound myself up to a man when I so quietly leaned in for an embrace when he so readily put out his cigarette to hold me It’s no wonder I fell in love.
‘Dad’ is naked and lonely, unfinished … tipped up at the end like a question. ‘My Dad’ is recollection and whole, a statement and a claiming. ‘Dad’ feels foreign in my mouth, mochi to my potato palette. I am not a daughter who says ‘Dad’. Or I am no longer a daughter who says ‘Dad’. I have now tipped the scales. Today I sit on the side of my life where I have talked about my father more than I ever spoke to him. I do not miss the slow burn disappointment waiting for his call. I do not miss the twisting churn of his failure. I do not miss the warm weight of his guilt. Still, his death stole some wicked small fundamental parts of me and my convenient ‘not missing’ has burrowed a hole into my self left a hungry wound. It’s time to mourn. It’s time to visit his grave and exhume the bits of myself I buried with him. Time to learn to walk away from a man who didn’t treat me well and NOT leave anything behind. How do I choke on the truth and stay present with the cold panic of this pain? How do I sit with the knowledge that he gave me so very little, that with his death I only lost the unlikely hoping he would suddenly want to father me? As the sun rises today I sit with the burn and the twist and the crush. I hold it in shaking hands like riverside clay, sifting and squinting, searching for worth and truth. As the sun rises today I am brave like boot buckles like Marlboro Reds. I swagger into the poetry. Here we go Dad. Here we go.
I’ve not done NaPoWriMo before. Last year I dabbled, a poem here and there – but this year it feels necessary …
My father died in 1993, when I was 17, and I didn’t have the tools or the capacity to really grieve his death. There is complexity in that relationship, years of abandonment and hurt and disappointment … and, of course, there have been ramifications due to my inability to grieve … including my involvement in two very complex and neglectful and hurtful and disappointing marriages.
It’s time for me to heal. It’s time to let my father finally rest. NaPoWriMo 2019 will be dedicated to my dad, a written memorial and a step forward.
Heather Gwinn Poetry 