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My Father, Naked at 28
- University of Wisconsin Press
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MY FaTHer, NaKeD aT 28 My grandmother is spread overYucca Valley. out past Joshua Tree where my father dropped acid till he was 28. He was not invited to trek up the mile and a half of semi-arid underbrush. where the path wound like a dirty thread through redwoods. where my uncles and grandfather each took a handful of her. sprinkled her over the Saradine Cliffs and said a prayer. They told the air things like Mother,you are home. They wiped their faces with white cuffs and rubbed ash-covered hands over flesh-dry ones. and drove home. and told my father where she was spread. sent him the program with pictures oflilies and portions of hymns. Today my father takes me out to the tip of the porch. faces west. as if he is not nine states from her ashes. She wrestles Forgivers ofthe air now. The air and not the earth. He points to where the sun mellows and pinks the skylike raspberry sherbet my mother serves. My father says. I've called her Helen since I was 17. A!Y brothers told her I never loved her. I was 11 when I saw the picture of my father: bathrobe open. genitals covered with a glued-on shred of paper. his beard a set ofwiry brown wafers stretched to his chest. his eyes like half-cracked eggs. blue yolks of bitter intelligence. Grandmother had said to me. That's your dad long-long ago, before hegot saved. I like to remind myselfhowfar he's come. ...