My dad & sardines

my dad's going to give me a self

back.

i've made an altar called

The Altar for Healing the Father & Child,

& asked him what i could do

for him so he would

do nice for me. he said i should stop

saying bad things about him &, since

i've said just about everything bad

i can think of &, since . . . well,

no, i change my

mind, i can't promise

him that. but even healing is

negotiable, so, if he's in

heaven (or trying

to get in), it wouldn't hurt

to be in touch. the first thing i want is to be able to

enjoy the little things again—for example, to stop peeling

down the list of things i

have to do &

enjoy this poem, enjoy how, last night, scouring

the cupboards, i found a

can of sardines that

must be five

years old &, since i was home after a long

trip &, since it was 1 a.m. & i hadn't eaten

dinner &, since there was no other

protein in the house,

i cranked it open & remembered that

my dad loved

sardines—right before bed—with

onions & mustard. i can't get into

my dad's old heart, but i remember that look

on his face when he would

load mustard on a saltine cracker, lay a little

fish on top, & tip it with a juicy slice

of onion. then he'd look up from his soiled

fingers with one eyebrow

raised, a rakish

grin that said—all

for me!—as if he was

getting away

with murder.

Source: The Undertaker's Daughter (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2014)