by Josh Olsen

KT said she feels like I make him up,

but I think when I talk about him

it’s the only time she ever really believes me.

I tell her that I dream about him –

mom brings him to Birthdays or Easter.

I bump into him at the Pic-A-Nic Basket

buying pepperoni stix.

I pull up next to him at a red-light.

Sometimes he confronts me.

Asks where I’ve been all this time.

Why I’ve been running away.

Other times I break his nose or tell him

my mom didn’t deserve

the way he treated her. Treated us.

That he turned my brother into a cutter.

Sometimes I wake up feeling guilty.

That I should make amends.

Should write him a letter and

let him meet his grandkids.

Then mom tells me she talked to him

the other day. That he called her

a whore. Called my sisters bastards.

Called me a coward.