I love my father,
but I do not know him.
I hold warm memories
soft laughter,
the hum of his voice
saying something I can't recall,
a hand on my shoulder once
but they blur when I try to look closer.
I know he loves me.
I've been told.
He's never said it,
but I've heard it in
gestures, in silences,
in the way he calls me
"kid" instead of my name.
I'm told we are the same
the tilt of a head,
the way we fold our arms,
stubbornness,
a quiet kind of anger.
But I don't feel like him.
Or maybe I do,
but I don't know how to name it.
He has taught me things,
but not the kind of things
you say out loud.
More like
how to sit in the same room as someone
and not speak,
how to love from a distance
without meaning to.
This man is my father.
I love him.
And I don't know him.
And I don't know if I ever will.
