For those times you raised your hand at me but stopped yourself, I thank you.

And for those times you couldn’t, I forgive you.

I’m grown now and know the bottle’s bite

See how seconds of a clock fall like insects to the floor

Piling up all the places we should be by now.

What I don’t miss are the cigarettes

Smoking themselves all night and into the next morning

Ribbons of blue twisting slowly in a muted sun-ray

And your tired eyes, wired wide awake.

Instead I think about sitting in the bathtub

Eating oil and vinegar sandwiches, lots of mayo

While you rub my back

It was the only way I’d get clean.

Today when I speak with spite, it is your tone I hear

And when I touch with tenderness, it is your grace I carry.

This year I will be the age you were when you had me.

I will not be in AA, I will not be cheating on my loved one

But with a mouth as wide, and an appetite for chaos

Relentless as it is insatiable

Who’s to say I’m so far behind you?

All along I’ve been collecting pieces

Too heavy to carry by yourself.

They are not my choices nor my secrets

But still they are you, and so I keep them close.

It’s getting harder to tell

Where you end, and I begin.