Mother, I Wish
Pushing creativity
I have a good imagination, Daddy. Since you never come to see me. Us together. I imagine everything.
Kids without parents grow wild imaginations. They say things like if and when. They dream dreams big enough to hold safety nets and fathers. Dusty boxes holding happy-parent-photo-albums and singed hope. Because
a child with no father is a feeling. Like a wet blanket. Like a predator stalking through jungle. Like a little girl with poisonous flowers. I think of my daughter and spit up apologies. Then coffee mugs get the words. Not her. I pinch my arm until it hurts. Me beneath tyrant skies. Talking to break-apart-Styrofoam clouds. When it rains I’m a thunderhead.
I swallow my days without chewing. Wake up on rusted iron mornings and pouch shortcomings like chaw. A lot of days the past gets all my thought, and it’s hard to pay it forward when I’m sending reparations into the past. I don’t know where I would be without my imagination. I bet you know about some of the stories it’s invented. Some people might even call a few genius.
They’re nothing compared to the stories that kept me alive. The imaginary friends, stuffed animals come to life every night, little black boy, bone white three-quarter moon in the corner of my room when it got really bad.
