What I Leave Out When I Pray

I remember being bathed in the kitchen sink

by my Grandmother. I have lived in depths.

Little depths. The warmth of the water,

the arc of the sun through the window,

the smell of suds – I remember.

I remember being carried

to my bedroom in the arms of my father,

and how the light in the hallway

after having closed eyes for so long

was bleached yellow, altered yellow, different and strange.

When I was a child I used to play with light.

I remember considering what to leave out when I prayed.

This was my birth as a writer.

My first lies were prayers.

My prayers had a beginning, a middle, and an end

And I always saved a cat at the beginning.

I am sitting alone in a coffee shop. I am thirty.

I am young enough to live entirely over again

and still be younger than my father is now.

Being carried makes me comfortable.

Only I can carry myself these days.

My father is too old.