The Father

He rarely spoke of the past and when he did, it was
in flashes—the Norwegian girl from ESL classes those first

American years, how she scared them all riding horses bare-
back, eating apples whole: seeds, stem, core. The Japanese

boy serenading the class about sake. The first
Coca-Cola he drank in the new country. How in Korea

he buried their dead pets in the mountains one 
after another so the waters wouldn’t wash their bones

away. Time sparkles like spilled soda on his lips, like polished 
tin. We never got an answer we asked for,

but sometimes he would share, like rare lightning: I had 
a friend shot working his mother’s convenience store

in Detroit I had a friend stabbed in a dirty NYC alley
I had bars on my bedroom windows I had my knocked

out teeth replaced in pirate’s gold I had blood on my 
mouth I had rice but not meat I had only a little

English I had to cut my fingers so I didn’t have
to practice piano I had a screaming match with my 어머니

I had a second chance in college, and another, and another 
and then another I had a year in Canada with your mother

a country with mountains ready for burial in every direction 
I had a sprained ankle I had a bike but no car I had food

but no money I had my father’s drinking problem I had a life 
left behind I had to leave behind the dead I had you—

Read more from Issue 21.1.