Listen! I want to say something!

When I was so tiny I couldn’t move myself by myself

You put slices of pears in my mouth;

 And sat me on your stomach and laughed,

Showing up delighted in the pictures mom took

With a camera that was shabby even for the 90’s.

 

And when I was a small child you said “Honey.”

“Honey, I know what they say, but you are like me.”

Teaching me how to look at the world in a way

That didn’t make me feel like I was just dumb and little:

You let me be a princess in my strange, strange,

Too-into-magic-and-stories-and-words way. 

 

Older, I said; “Oh I could never do what you did – never do that.”

You told me that I could be a good engineer if I set my mind to it.

And when I though I knew what I wanted, kept your opinion as I went,

Saying I’d be a good lawyer. Or a good mother.

Or a good nurse anesthetist.

Or a good business owner.

 

And when I was old enough to feel the weight of myself around my neck

You didn’t back away, but you didn’t put up with my self-loathing either,

Giving me words like fractured mirrors, in which to see myself

Just a little bit at a time, but enough to pull me back into the light:

Enough to guide me back out of the darkness of the forest

And you were honest! How were you honest?

 

They say a lot of things about what fathers must do for daughters,

But I know you did the right thing for me, which was talk;

Telling me about the way the world worked even if I couldn’t understand,

Giving me glow-in-the-dark stars of discussions, 

And letting me hurl myself, bouncing off you in arguments

That I never won because you have a mind like a hound dog.

 

Father, now I find myself strange; tall, irreverent, anxious, fierce,

And fashioned like steel against the world.

I am like my ancestresses sharpening swords on their breasts,

Like my ancestresses carrying babies tied to their hips,

Like my ancestresses toting shotguns to church,

Like my ancestresses getting college degrees at 65.

 

Sometimes I want to scream “YOU MADE ME WHO I AM!”

And curse you out because I’m too much of something.

Sometimes I want to laugh “You made me who I am!”

And bow in gratitude to you for giving me these gifts.

My Father, because you saw who I was, I am who I am

I can only say, “You gave me the map, and I am finding freedom!”