Member-only story
To My Carrion Daddy
How small do I need to be for you to love me?
Hours.
I pour hours into each bony protrusion.
Clench my hollow jaws
Eviscerate viscera
Escape.
Only, I’m not trying to. Escape.
Byzantine cage of my own ligaments.
If I make myself small enough,
I get to pretend I am
A tiny hair inside my father’s elephantine ear.
Get to pretend, get to control
The supernova way he waltzed into our house.
It’s a trick I’ve never told anyone
Except drunk between two nicotine stains
But I draw smiley faces in the puke on the
Bathroom floor we time-share.
Me and my terror of men with elephantine ears.
I’m strong enough, grown-up enough
To lose my father once,
But not to keep losing him.
All them vacuous mornings after I learn
I’m nobody’s baby, it’s not the worst
Worst can be done to me
Worse. The rhythm to the chaos
That keeps exploding in me
Is worse.
