I've known that I have to write this
For a while now.
That hasn't made it any easier.
A part of me has wished that his heart would beat my pen to it.

It's time.

While my father is still alive

The doctors say he doesn't have much time left.
I have never heard their voices,
Never saw their faces.

My father's face
Is the only one
I am not afraid to forget.

I try to will it away.
Find myself scanning for it in the mirror,
Try to paint myself someone else's daughter.

I worry about a nightmare recurring.
About seeing him, imagined in flesh.

I have not been in the same state as my father since I was 13.

People tell me that I will wish I had seen him
Before it was too late.

What they don't know is that I do see my father.

I see my father
On Thanksgiving
My older brother's anger bouncing off the walls.
I couldn't stop smiling, and giggling,
Until I teared up.
It was not funny,
Obviously,
But my body didn't know how else
To fight the fear.

I see my father
In hands.
Nails painted by my sister,
Peeling tissue from my face.
I wait
For an apology
In my father's voice.
"I mean, I love you, but..."
My sister swallows it,
Silent.
I forgive her.

I see my father
In my little brother's signature.
Junior. Jaded.
His voice is getting deeper,
Eerily familiar.
I know it's not fair,
But I try to drown it out.
I focus on the fluff
Of his hair,
I wish his teachers could see
Our mother working against the yellow slips
They give him.

I see my father
In my mama's smile.
Every breath
Is a rebellion
Against him.
How can anyone expect me
To balance love for both of them?
I would be so at odds
With the opposite genes in me.

I see my father
In girls I fall in love with.
The crying sounds the same.
I am not my mama yet,
I still sleep with the memory of them,
Not big enough to fill this bed.
They are not bad enough to forget.

My father
Is not different enough to forgive.
Some days, I worry I am the same as him.

I think it is impossible
To rearrange your fingerprints,
To orphan yourself
From a man who raised you.
Who put you down.

Before he put you into the ground...

It is not easy to hate him.
I'm afraid it will not be even harder when he is.
When he is dead.

He texts me sometimes.
He's always praying that I have a good day.
He wakes up in a hospital beds.
He asks to hear my voice.
He is looking for forgiveness
From a god
Who has my family's face.

He's looking for a life after this.

I know that there will be life
After my father dies.

I just don't know
What parts of me to change
Or what parts of me to celebrate

While my father is still alive.