June 21st - Juliette Humphreys

I've been listening to bluegrass to ignore the basket case of daddy issues poetry on my dresser. I'm too scared to feel him dying, how our joy sits alone, nestled crevices of syllables, bliss is not Sanctum, Senryu, survivors' guilt. His hair didn’t get to gray. most of it fell out. When will mine do the same? He said my hair was magic, thick like rope when he’d rip it out, tying it into knots. Now my hair sheds in clumps into the brush, the stress of our age showing. He’s not scared to die but he will scream in pain when it comes. My pre-written eulogy is filled with more questions than insightful anecdotes of who this man is and who he made me to be. I wonder if he'd shoot a jackalope. He saw the good and liked the good and took the good. He’s been bad but. He’s always had a phone book for a chest, too brave to *67. I answer his calls and he sighs. Would he like my voice better if i screamed or whispered? Would he hear it? Did he hear my first cry at birth? Did his hands shake cutting the cord as they shake now pouring stale coffee down the sink?. He buys coffee, newspaper, and an almond Hershey bar because he was a kid once too. The last time he cried was when he told me santa wasn’t real. When will be the next? I drove to the intersection of passion and suffering and they all knew him. It’s hard to leave someone you’ve bled on. We are both homesick in our separate bedrooms. This is not what we expected.