Sleeve of Memory

1 Minute Read Time

The silhouette of a man in a baseball cap holding up his son against an orange sunset on the ocean — Photo by Suhash Villuri on Unsplash

He taught me no
               two blows sound the same, 
a ringing still lives in my ear
               singing a song called

be quiet. I’ve hidden his gold rings 
               in my throat, near
the little boy—his face buried
               in his palms, ready to catch

not tears but the butterflies 
               his stomach
spills from his eyes—we share
               a body that doesn’t know

where to run. Neither of us remember 
               hearing the word son
or how to embrace someone in the eyes 
               when they say, I love.

Don’t think, That is such a shame. It’s not.
               To remember things as they 
were is counterintuitive
               for survival. I love my father.

See how I did that. I changed
               the color of the sky by closing 
my eyes & opening a bottle
               he didn’t drink. If I were anything

like God, I wouldn’t hide in the celestial 
               sleeve of memory, I’d retune the heart
strings of hard men & offer 
               them a new language;

where their hands aren’t the tool, 
               but a tongue. & then CLAP
like thunder, he’d ask for forgiveness.
               Who, God? Yes, him too.

Bernardo Wade

a writer and artist from New Orleans, studies at Indiana University Bloomington, serves as associate editor of Indiana Review, is a Watering Hole Fellow, and moonlights as an equity and justice advocate. He was recently awarded the 2021 Puerto del Sol Poetry Prize and has work in or forthcoming in Crazyhorse, Black Warrior Review, Guernica, Poetry Northwest, and elsewhere.

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