Sometimes I get lost in what Kaveh writes in the glass jar at 3 am
The stretching search terms
The orders filling in the basket
The length of film I had taken to get developed
My father carrying negatives
Only to find the sweltering sun he misses
Has singed the only picture of his
Youth and his leg wide open
And cut from the time God had marked him for
Death and he had narrowly escaped
Through a broken window on a bus
And his whole leg is a shining oscillating tale
Thin as onion skin
Thin with tears
Growing soft with disuse
The nerves that have curled up and died
I press his leg and he doesn’t know I’m there
Couldn’t tell if I was air or nothing or a needle stitching what fell apart again
I spend money like it belongs to me instead of it being borrowed
But each note is so sweet I fold them as small and as thin as I can
Feed them into the camera and tell my father I can bring his youth back if he smiles
I can heal his leg with my lens
But my length of film is empty
There are these two spots where something tried to be born
And I can’t face my father’s defeated face
Thinned with tears
So I avoid him at noon, the sunset in the living room
At night, 2 am, fair, dawn, father forgive me these little things