Dear dad-
did you ever lay your eyes on me?

I remember in agony and melancholy,
My entire childhood was spent wondering what hell did I do to you
and what heaven could I have done
to keep you around.

Are you aware what dad’s absence does to a baby?
Do you even care?
All the feigned petty pities
The taunts and haunts from peers?
The self-hate I developed within?
The depressions and alienations I suffered?
The remarkable sense of rejection and degradation?

No.
I guess you don't!

If you ever cared about anyone else
but yourself you would have stuck around, at least for your child.
Your own blood.

Innumerable questions I had.
Zero answers I got.

I brought the thinking and wondering
To a halt long ago.
After all, I had a golden mother
She acted mummy and daddy at a go

But there is something I need to ley you know

I didn’t want your money.
Nor do I do now.
I wanted you.
I wanted the confidence
that comes with the knowledge
that dad cares.

Where were you when a girl took
my heart and ran away with it?
She left me feeling beaten and broken
- worthless bastard!

That time I needed dad for a confidant.
To tell me I was unbreakable. Invincible. Simply indomitable.
You weren’t their for me.
You will never be.
That I'm acutely aware

For so long I held
onto the anger you fueled.
I’ve held on it for so long,
because for you I had been longing
Wasn’t it the only picture
-the only memory of you I had!

Despite the eons of anger and hurt,
I took no umbrage.
Against you I harbour no grudge.
I forgave you for having left me
Without a word.
I too ask that you forgive me
for the wrongs I didn’t know I did.
Probably before I was born!

©DMN 2020 Ed