On alabaster starlight,
The primrose mantel bleeds orange;
My vacant ancestry dreams for glory,
On cloven canopy father's hands fall flat--
In the middle of my chest--
I feel the pressure-- building;
Decadent in his long lost fatherhood,
Your love knows no bounds;
Beyond fire and water--
The wind turns to sand;
I am anchored-- knee-deep in baby-steps,
Where were you?
The bottle held you closer than I could;
Have I failed to make amends on naked memories?
Daddy, came home-- dead-- nearly;
Tripping, falling-- on glass, on photographs,
On my family portrait,
It all came down,
Under drunken fortitude;
Wash it away-- with whispers, with promises-- broken;
I taste your voice-- cold, cruel, mean;
In this web, you fed-- my self-esteem away;
To this day, the bottle still takes you-- away,
From me, from us-- from all we could have been;
Please, daddy-- come back, to me.
©Ashley Leslie 2013
