he should never have had a family
I watched a man die and be dead
I can’t find my way back
someone unknown contributed to my birth
someone who slept in the same house
but left, was always leaving, or took what he needed
there was something wrong with you
I can still feel it
the lack of language
how you weaponised your body
the debris is still here
I lived a life that wasn’t mine
your life was always something I wasn’t allowed to see
how fragile this hair-like thread between us is
anonymous
how much pain it never ceased to hold
I sit within this absence of affection and remembrance
listened to how you became generic
one of many
nobody seems to have known you really
I don’t know who my father was
all I know is how his fractures fractured me
and that he always forgot to pick me up
Croque-Melpomene 