He moved like a feral cat

skittish, entire body shaking

“Don’t look at me”, he said

but when I looked, what I saw wasn’t my father

it wasn’t him with a broken red nose

it wasn’t him with a swollen lip, missing front teeth

it wasn’t him with blood-soaked hair and wides eyes

that never stopped quivering

“Are you real?”, he grabbed my arm

squeezed it too tight

“I took too much acid,”

he said

but I found an empty box

of cough medicine in the trash

eight more boxes in the cabinet

he wanted to find his tooth

he fell to the floor and crawled

around the small apartment

he pounded his fists on the carpet

laughed at the mirror

“Does it hurt?” I asked

I cleaned the blood of him

with water, soaked towels

washed his head in the tub

he asked me questions

not understanding my answers

he called me stupid

said he was disappointed in me

I was getting fat

he sat on the couch

watching a film under some blankets

his dead eyes never left the screen,

“Please don’t leave me,” he said

he mumbled something about wanting forgiveness

I closed the door on him