by Mary E. Lowd
Have you ever looked at your father’s eyes
Lighting up with love
As he talks about you
When you were a baby
Only to have him dismiss
Everything you say
Brush aside
Every opinion
Every feeling you have
Everything you are right now
But he calls it love
It isn’t love
It’s some kind of strange fetishization
Of a creature too small
To yet communicate how scared she is
How much he’s hurting her
How his unreliability
His unpredictability
His eruptive anger
Erratic distance
Are scarring you
And leaving you broken
And struggling
Confused and lonely
In a deep part of your clenched fist
Of a heart
For the rest of your life
Because you can see that brightness
In his eyes
That should be yours
But he’ll only give it to you
If you shrink yourself down
To a baby again
And you never, ever will