Birthday Suits

I turned twenty-four and

dad decided to take

another stab at making

a man out of me.

On his command, I drove us

out to Hollywood where

you could get three sets of suits

for a hundred bucks.

What a steal! he exclaimed

as though his enthusiasm

would fertilize

something that never

existed within me.

Regardless, I followed him

into the outlet and I

allowed him to wrap

the cheap, heavy thread

around my tired shoulders,

to salt the wound of my body

with his idea of truth.

I let it happen

but I did not forget

what I was

beneath the cover of the flesh:

five million faggy mountains

slicing through fields full

of dreamed-up tongues and

unnamable bluish grasses

each blade the length

of a universe

stretching inward toward

a singular point

of

life-sustaining unlogic—

Dressing myself behind

the heavy polyester curtain,

I listened

as dad held the suit guy hostage

with the oft-told tale

of the night he encountered

real-life Biblical demons,

how at first he felt their presence

tightening inside his chest,

and then witnessed them crawling

up and down his walls

and how he prayed and cursed them

in the name of the lord

until they dissolved

like sugar into the dark

And he never said this, but I

knew he was convinced they

came for me next

and colored my nails

and stretched out my hair

and adorned me with flowers

and forced my inside places to whisper

woman         woman               woman

late each night at the

moment just

before sleep

And I knew he knew

who I was becoming

and I understood

what the suits were for      So

I tossed them in the back

of my trunk

where they sat

waiting for years

and the day I sold that car off

those suits were still in there