We open
the closed door:
Dad, greasy hair,
in a blue-checkered gown.
Tubes cometing outward
from his arms.
James stroking Dad’s needled hand,
sobbing,
like this is his darkest white place.
Mom fingers one of her dark curls,
rests her hand on Dad’s shoulder.
He looks up at her, nods.
She looks into his eyes,
tells us the HIV has progressed
to full-blown AIDS—
Dad has contracted TB
and the beginning stages of Kaposi’s sarcoma,
which causes lesions.
He has just a few,
nothing internal.
Dad coughs, reaches up to hold Mom’s hand,
while James, head down, still strokes the other.
Because of all this, they’ve given him
one month to live.
The clock hands spin.
The truth tick-tocks:
school, Dad’s life,
everything’s ending at once.
Dad starts talking but I can’t listen:
All this time I knew things were bad
but he still seemed somewhat stable.
I notice Dad’s toes peeking out
from beneath the hospital blankets
and for the first time I see
a small lesion on the underside
of his pinky.
I try
to escape,
move the bars off the windows
with my mind—
I jump into the cold
weave through countless buildings
dive into other people’s windows
I scrape the sky, scouting for warmer air
fling past rooftops and fly.