wrote my father a note

so last night i wrote my father a note.

hey dad:

i was sitting in a cubicle today thinking about a poem i've been trying to write for you, but nothing seemed to make it's way from my head to my page.
last night i put my head on a goose feather pillow and my body under a down comforter and i put my arm around a boy.
well - not a boy - a man.

it felt good, but this morning i felt a sense of uneasiness because i remembered that one june when you and i walked to the corner store in the middle of the block.
i remember the two men in tight jeans and jheri curls, standing outside waiting on a cab, minding their own business.
i remember nobody really giving a shit about what was going on.
then you said it: 'fucking faggots need to get the fuck on.'

last night i lay next to a boy who will attend every graduation, clapping when my name is called. there will be flowers at show openings and tears at curtain closings.

this morning i stood in the mirror trying to keep my tie from going beyond the belt buckle.
i learned to tie a windsor knot on google.

i remember you telling me how much you hated faggots and how you only had two girls - not three.
and i remember how your face was never in the sea of faces at track meets or plays.
your voice was never heard among the hundreds screaming for the children with numbers on their back as they ran the bases.
i've walked across a few stages in a cap and gown, taking pictures with proud strangers and smilings moms and stepfathers.
i don't remember you there.
i remember you at that corner store in the middle of the block hating faggots.

i must be a faggot.
i must be one of those men you've hated because i don't remember you loving me outside of occassional tickles and the "my son's in college" line you'd blurt out in conversations with equally irresponsible friends to make them feel bad about their children.

they went home to their children, and woke up with their children, and walked their children to school.
and because they knew high school graduation would be the apex of their child's life, they made it a priority to be there when their name was called, because they knew that their child would thank them for everything.

so i must be one of those faggots.

so last night while i slept i held the hand of a boy who will not hate me.
even if tonight finds itself alone in the 'good memory' section of his brain, he will not hate me for anything.

i've thought of jailing you in my head in a cell with large homosexual sex offenders with syphillis.
then i figured this note may do what they are unable to do:

reach you.

it's not a hate thing.
i do this for love.

signed...

me.



and i closed the notebook, hoping the ink and tears wouldn't create some sort of chemical bond and stick the pages together. i needed these letters to be sharp in case the razor enclosed isn't.

so last night - after kissing a boy and letting him know that i am who i am because my father is who he is - i signed, sealed and delivered this letter to my father.