father, hallowed be thy name

i.
slight,
amber bottle
lying, veiled:
peaking through
cotton sheathes.
it pleads
delicately, so
i take it.

and i saw
how Mom
would always
throw you
out and away.
and yet
how frail
you feel,
with such care
misplaced.

and i ask
why
on Earth
would you ever
will this
be done.

one step
forward,

one step
back,

you muse:

just think
of it,
think of it
as if it
were art:

why
can i not
express
how
i want it
to be
expressed?

what do you do
when your art
is not art?
when your art
is a defect"
an error"
a vice?

what do you do
when your art
seems to
never, ever
impress
what you
ever, ever
wish to
express?
you

destroy it.

ii.
like always
you’re right,

and always
you will
be right:

and always

you will only
ever be
just another
dope-fiend,

Your Honor
overrules.

my
Atticus:
never could you
have known,

afterall.

or did you
or did you
or did you.

iii.
hospital bed:
fluid dripping
and draining
into a poor,
eighty pound
shell. she
wakes for a
moment
by a
touch;
the father
leaves softly
one kiss upon
her pale,
august crown.

she dreams,
and it is
still; an
image that
is faint: a
young girl
and a father
sitting on one
little bed;
they are playing
pretend,
pantomiming
with their hands,
as if their hands
were people.

the father
stretches out
one arm;
the daugther
flexes her
forefinger"
pinky out"
imitating two,
little legs.
and she
walks those
little legs
up along
his arm.

and the
little girl
wills it so
that her
little person"
with her
little legs"
makes an
error:

her little person,
she stumbles;
her little person
falls down.

and so,
they laugh.

and we are
watching this
as if we
are floating
afar,
as if we
are drifting
away.

and her
dream grows
evermore dim;
and her
dream falls
evermore soft;
until it is
nothing more
than a distant,
pale hum:
as it is
in Heaven.