My Father by Jordan Merenick
hesitantly unfurled
a white table cloth
coyly positioned between
two sliding poles
kicking up dust
from the arid living room
below.
i still taste (that same dust)
it’s granular WASP indecisiveness
calcified by the pressure
of missing & missed opportunities
lodged between my teeth
now,
as i’ve begun to furrow
my own life (just like you always wanted)
in a mid atlantic cul-de-sac.
with just enough acreage & education
to adumbrate
my own post modern
arability,
i wish
i could of folded you up
inside my breast pocket
carrying you
away
but i was only a child
and you were
heavy...
“I wanted this poem to speak very powerfully on the complex relationship between a father and son. How as a son, you try to leave your father’s legacy behind but you are ultimately more alike than you care to admit. Perhaps it was the way I structured this poem or my word choice like using the word adumbrate that caused this poem to be trash.”
Jordan Merenick is an poet from Pittsburgh, PA. He has been published in Nitrogen House, Clover & White, and Lighting Tower Press. He can be reached at jordanmerenickwrites on IG.