Tears rush forth from
a jagged chasm
and we study them under
a microscope to determine exactly
what kind of weeping
this is. I seek
an unknown
grandfather, research genetics and
epigenetics,
rest in the simple
reasons for this desire of mine to
stop, lay down and sigh me
asleep.
My father made and he makes
impossible promises to sober up
and I forgave and I forgive him
because I can walk the path
of his pain all the way
back to 1492, observe it in an
anthropological kind of way.
I’ve made a habit of quietly shaping
myself around the melancholy
minds of others, the how and
the why and
at what moment
they first felt
the ancient wound, an anemic smile
cut to the tune of a man locked away
in a log cabin, alone for the winter and
maybe forever. Blank
snow, stark branches,
sharp wind—it’s rude, how
the days sing
of our trauma without first asking if
we’d like to discuss it. You sing to me
and I am healed
and undone.
