Dad would have swallowed the bottle whole
had it not been for the sheer size of it.
It was just as well he didn’t.
He spent more time kissing and nurturing
that glassy eyed mistress than he did me.
He once told me, ‘Son, I want to leave my mark upon you.’…”
He did, with a five inch bruise that ran up the back of my leg.
What he really wanted, I reckon, was to tell me he loved me.
My friends said he had a strange way of showing it.
I disagreed. Truth was, I didn’t know any better.
Love, for me, was often a men’s 36 inch leather belt.…
Once it was a cowboy boot. I hate westerns.
I was a drifter at five.
Here.…
There.
Never quite anywhere.
I had more moms and dads than any five year old could count.…
Foster care does that to you.
It did it to me.
That old second hand must have gone ‘round a zillion times-
because I’m all grown up now
and to this day I’m not really sure who I am.
I never fell in love with a bottle.
My bruises have long since faded.
Bruises don’t scar, by the way.
I am a better man today than yesterday.
I talk to Dad every now and then.
I fear that the poison is rotting him.
He’s a beautiful man, never-the-less.
Sometimes I cry for him - not because I need him - I cry for him.
I cry that his pain will vanish.
I cry that his plight will one day be surrendered.
I cry that his one and only will fail to return and when it does…
his empty hands will heal and his blistered lips will kiss my forehead
again.

08/04/2005

Posted on 08/04/2009
Copyright © 2025 Gregory R Schelske