Haiku for Daddy

I

Bed. My dream portal.

Light shaft from the hall floods. I

Know. I will not sleep.

II

Up the stairs, his knee

Cracks. A sound known too well. His

Silhouette numbs me.

III

Speaking my name, “Are

You awake?” Pretended sleep

This time? Like last night?

IV

“Yes.” It is my voice.

Now he’s three-dimensional.

And near. My eyes close.

V

I break like a stick-

Figure. My legs move like pins.

The dream portal shuts.

VI

I am as shards of

Glass. And I bleed easily.

The taking begins.

VII

We are here on a

Bed of nails. He knows not

I am abducted.

VIII

Time is vertical

And missing. Now I’ve become

Unfamiliar.

IX

When I return, here

Is sticky-hot and messy.

Here is blood. I’m cut.

X

Whatever happens

It snows hard, yet spring still comes.

Flowers mask Earth’s scars.

XI

A new “I” will know.

Always. But this “I” of me

Forgets. For so long.

XII

“Daddy, I love you.”

He is my magician. Some-

Times he transforms Hell.

XIII

It will be lives sure

Before voices of mem’ry

Bleed through my paper.

XIV

For now, I am a

Mobius strip, looped in a

Life, rain can’t make clean.