You know,

A friend once told me,

It was something she saw behind my eyes

That made her want to get close to me

And be friends

And so I asked her,

What did she possibly see,

Behind my gaze every other week?

And she said PAIN,

And there it was, yet again.

That word that flooded my brain

And repressed memories stacked and stained

What was left of my cerebral membrane

 

So I don’t know how I got to this point

 

So I keep thinking of an intro.

The sketch of the pencil to the canvas,

Is the thought that brought me to you,

When I had no access.

 

When mom told me that you and her just couldn’t work out

After a certain age,

The reality set in,

But to deal with it was another journey.

Outsider not to just the world,

But to your family too.

 

Because it’s been some time,

When I think of you,

I simply ask,

What is a parent? And what is a child?

 

A Parent,

A father or a mother,

A caregiver of the offspring in their own species,

A caretaker of a Child.

 

A Child,

A son or daughter of any age,

A young person,

An immature or irresponsible person,

And at that moment I get confused,

(because of those words: immature, irresponsible)

because Mom always gave me this reason for why I would never see you

 

You were “irresponsible”.

But, but, a child should have the right to be irresponsible, right?

Not a parent, right?

But, you were the exception,

The void in my life that made question my existence.

 

For you were the father I never knew,

Except through the sketch of the pencil to the canvas.

 

For you were the father I never knew,

I saw you in your final days, withering away from an inclining decay,

And the impact of losing you hadn’t made me realize

How much I engulfed my life in my interpretation of your shadow

 

For you,

It was easy to find new path and detach,

Call it ‘quits’ and wait for the next dispatch,

For your turn at accidental paternity again,

And to stick with your partner’s maternity was to be a sin

 

So you looked at me as below hell,

Beyond the bowels you would ever forcefully reach,

But to still find you bound,

By the very pulse of my heartbeat.

 

My heart pumped blood before it pumped soul,

As I find my refuge wasn’t in your arms,

Or your wisdom or lack thereof.

It was in the moments and the people a far distance away,

Who subtly made me,

With their unrestricting love,

Regret my last name.

 

I found myself to originally be framed,

In the image of you,

From the moment I left the womb,

But how do you mimic the image of absence?

After I was several months in this world,

You took to a new life already, steadily packing.

So that left me without many options,

Had it not been for a wise stepdad,

I’d be fatherless,

With you looking at a mirror of yourself.

Now could you have looked at me HONESTLY,

And say you were proud to be a father.

Sadly, I can’t ask,

Because you’re either six-feet deep, cremated, or maybe in a grave.

 

Not that you’re gone,

I ask for one last and simple favor.

I ask for you to look over me,

You owe me that.

But I want to know,

What do I owe you?

What do you want from me?