And when, in the city in which I love you,
even my most excellent song goes unanswered,
andI mount the scabbed streets,
the long shouts of avenues,
and tunnel sunken night in search of you...
That I negotiate fog, bituminous
rain rining like teeth into the beggar's tin,
or two men jackaling a third in some alley
weirdly lit by a couch on fire, that I
......
Lest he miss other children, lo!
His angel is his playfellow.
A riotous angel two years old,
With wings of rose and curls of gold.
There on the nursery floor together
They play when it is rainy weather,
Building brick castles with much pain,
Only to knock them down again.
......
You haven't finished your ape, said mother to father,
who had monkey hair and blood on his whiskers.
I've had enough monkey, cried father.
You didn't eat the hands, and I went to all the
trouble to make onion rings for its fingers, said mother.
I'll just nibble on its forehead, and then I've had enough,
said father.
......
The old priest Peter Gilligan
Was weary night and day
For half his flock were in their beds
Or under green sods lay.
Once, while he nodded in a chair
At the moth-hour of the eve
Another poor man sent for him,
And he began to grieve.
......
The fourth night I sway
on stage in the school
play is the night before
I'll wait in the hospital
lobby while my parents
sign me over to the doctors.
It's also the final night of the
show, the cast party. It's at
your house and your parents
have it catered. Piles of
......
I was there when they found him
Alive, barely inching across the concrete
he needed to go
Yes
He needed to go.
He needed a fact functioning friend
To dismiss, allieve,
Align with the lust for damnation.
To damn your dearest creation
However
......
Today my father walked away from me
I was 8 years old again
and all I could do was cry
as i grieved the love i never had
and yearned for the care he never gave me
You begged me not to confess, to lie about my quiddity,
for it pierces through your skin to hear my certitude and witness my color.
So, I listened and deceived you, as well as myself.
I did it for as long as air merged out of my body.
Still and all, the time arrived where I exhausted my soul.
You noticed but stayed blind.
That's the extent of the hatred you garnered to the man I embellished.
So I apologize, for I am what you loathe, father.
Fathers are like the ocean,
Vast deep, strong in motion,
Endless depths of love and care,
Always present, always there.
Like the waves that crash ashore,
Fathers protect us evermore,
Guiding us in life's rough tide,
Leading us to the other side.
......
On the jetty - in the mist - dry under ponchos
Surf pounding at concrete - biting at the shore
Glowing gaslamp beckoning gnats - freezing on the tank
Poles in hands - lines in water - standing in entwined silence
Coho spawning - swallowing offered bait
Father and Son sharing heartbeats and serenity