The lamplight is severe
white heat
meant to guide home.
I am at a hotel up the coast where I see
it’s all Catholic and Cohasset.
Men dine first and blood stinks
in the saltwater like mercury.
When I see my Father’s family
I no longer think
family is something
I should aspire to.
At the heads of dinner
tables, they believe in whiskey and first
place but divorce is putting yourself
too far first. Old money
lurks in murky midnight
tide pools where I cannot reach.
My Father’s parents are too
old to remember their children buried
to their neck in memories
of stormy seas and locked
doors. I watch, learning I can’t hold
a grudge when my grandmother
doesn’t recall my name.
Above and beneath
the horizon of human skin, I turn away
from the dinner table and look out
to the Atlantic instead.
The ocean washes away
warnings, but some remain.
A lesson in salt-cured, petrified bodies
of trust fund children beaten
by high tides
and expectations. Words without love
are parasites in the host of a family tree.
