As Big as a Father

I lost him the first time
before I could grasp
who he was, what he did, where
he fitted with her

and it's always seemed so dumb:
how to lose something
as big as a father.

I lost him the next time
to the rum-running Navy
who took him and took him
and kept right on taking

and it wasn't my mistake
losing a vessel
as big as a father.

I lost him a third time
to a ship in a bottle
that rocked him and rocked him
and shook out his pockets

and no kind of magic
could slip me inside
with my father.

I lost him at home
when floorboards subsided
as he said and she said
went this way and that way

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and dead in the water
I couldn't hang on
to my father.

The last time I lost him
I lost him for good:
the night and the day
the breath he was breathing

and death's head torpedoes
blew out of the water
the skiff of my father.