you are my father:

you are the curl of my hair

tight and dark, swept about my scalp like

corduroy scraps or

crushed velvet.

you are my bird-legs knock-knees

flesh and bones.

when I was a baby, just two

bundled in blankets, held soft

you snuck away before I was awake.

locked yourself in the car

held communion with carbon monoxide.

you let it invade,

coagulate in your throat.

your lover was quiet at home

holding your cotton-swathed daughter.

a jogger found you dead and

she wept.

you are my predisposition for tears in the back of the truck

for clutching my knees against isolation, rejection;

you are increased likelihood of suicide.

and

you are my love of poetry

the flush in my cheeks when I recall

performances and passages—

the mettle in my marrow

when I stand to give my own.