I always saw the humanity

behind his thick-lidded eyes, the small child,

begging for a banquet of golden crumbs

to appease the motherache churning

in his heart and stomach.

A thousand lions

pitted against a studded

chainsmoking beergutted gladiator,

I saw that too,

he, the lions, the gladiator,

the arena,

the smoke and booze,

all of it,

held hard in a concentrated siege,

a flash-flood and toxic smolder, and at his feet,

I cowered, and proceeded to bury myself.

He was my father,

still is.

The bond between us thick

as viscous chains,

the sort that perpetrate magma,

and rattle and clank

when carried by the blue shivery breath

of ghosts

down long hallways

branching out

into labyrinths

where every last bruised nothing

meets to forge bonds.

We are there, partly,

he and I, father and son,

but also, I am here,

a rampant indwelling,

a man who learned to take a saw

to chains,

warbling

heavy metal into blues,

a nightingale, moonthroated, with laryngitis,

yes, it is never too soon

or late to sing,

and I, in my mortal remains,

exist as living proof,

I am here, mostly,

a boy, a man,

the ghosts

no longer my enemies,

nor the bared teeth of an infant haunt,

but rather my teachers, my guides,

and when I look into his eyes,

I see staggered humanity, a small child,

a human doing the best he can,

I see myself, expanding

beyond the myth of lions

and gladiators,

I see myself,

rapt and sealed,

signing my name

to soul,

and blessed to know

Beauty’s lasting friendship.