Sitting on the balcony of a mega complex;

Looking down at the houses still holding out.

I think my father missed prison.

I miss you with every shattered, lonely atom in my body.

How could you?

How could you break me into a shape you have no use for?

In the eye of an empire,

With traumas as vast and varied

As it’s violences;

I will my body to accept change as the only constant

I will myself not to become a martyr

to the despair and hedonia

that materializes out of the shadows and concrete of this place.

I will myself not to internalize the way the allostatic load splinters my elbows.

I will myself to believe people

When they tell me who they are

My father missed prison more than he loved my mother.

I will this new body not to be his son.