father
© 1995 Devon Koren

i call to you from the depths of my twisted mortar heart
screams of dead echoes that stretch across the ocean midnight sky
my hands embed the design of rosary beads
deep into the mattress of my palm
my lips mumble at least sixteen sorrowful mysteries
perhaps more
to the velvet sack i whisper all of my hidden secrets in
stitched out of positively-charged negative material
these are the moments when i imagine all of the words we never said
exchanges lost broken on rusty telephone hinge wires of time
the abyss that ate all the christmas cards you never sent
the chasm where i lost all of my images of you reading me bedtime stories
and tucking me in to kiss my forehead good night
i can't write anymore, father,
i lost what little passion i once had to marble wolves with eyes of lead
my love, like everything else
like you
has undefined limits
and i accidentally test their expectancy too often sometimes
please don't hate me anymore
let me put my tiny hand in yours and help me chase all of the dragons away
i promise i'll repent all of my selfish futile damnations
the bruise on my ankle has faded by now i'm sure
i won't cry anymore
there is no justification for my loneliness
the desert of my hollow robin chest aches for the paternal monsoon
long since predicted
by prophets and their hoods of envious black from middle earth
i have perhaps eighty summers to my name, father,
perhaps less
and sixteen lay tattered, ruined, vanquished, debauched
saturated with tears and sadistic blood