Visiting Elizabeth (ROUND 7)

Let's workshop this poem about a teenager going with his father on a supervised visit to see his sister

scent of the day: Musc Gardénia Berke Khan, by Ensar Oud

first wear, need more time

honey sandalwood floral soap with herbal hints and a tuberose that makes for a strong connection to Meo Fusciuni’s Odor 93, which I like more. / I perhaps do enjoy this more then D’or version—it has more growl / but both have this throat tickling sensation of peach fuzz. / here there might be more dust (I would have to wear side by side to see), which also amplifies the vintage vibe / it is so cool how Ensar uses musk and ambergris in his compositions to do what iso e super and ambroxan do for the mainstream perfumers. / His compositions have great staying power for being so rooted in naturals. /

*Bolded today’s work.

Visiting Elizabeth

The last time I saw my stepsister Elizabeth—two decades,
even more, gone now—was the last our dad ever would.
It was in Poughkeepsie, the same stale building where
he had once faced me across the table. That day, under
CPS’s same file-cabinet eye, she was the age I had been.

Grandpa drove us up. My dad, nicked and AquaVelvaed,
rode half-swallowed by the chronic backseat garbage—
me, jittery too, on his lap. The battle against the bags
shifting and spilling, stink braided with Grandma crotch
and yapping yorkie, lent pitiful distraction to our nerves.

My dad said just to drop us at a gas station. “Here’s good,”
he pointed. “Need cigarettes.” But that was only half of it.
The Mazda idled in its junkyard cough as we left the store.
My dad was off beer. And Grandma had those hawk eyes 
pinned on the brown bag—too short—cradled in my arm. 

“Mike!” Grandma shouted as we passed by. “Hey Mike!”
But my dad strode onward, muttering. I followed his lead,
pretending not to hear. “The stuff—the camera!” I jogged
back, Timbs sloshing through slush, for the yellow Kodak
and the coloring book with its built-in bootleg crayons.

My dad cracked the King Cobra mid-stride, gulping swigs
with chin-dribbling desperation for the big day. “Aahh.”
We stopped under an icicle tree. City Hall loomed above.
We were late and he looked to me for helping sips. “Dad,
come on! No way. Ain’t going up in there all fucked up!” 

Who could my dad be—Newport cap new—but himself? 
He bargained. “Hold it for me, then.” My face the answer,
he fought reality. “You got baggy pants, Boy!” But I knew
not to roll into City Hall—after metal detectors, guards—
failing, ghetto as hell, to hold up my gurgling sweatpants.

The plan’s toy-box absurdity, thoughts of how thigh heat
(plus jostling) would flatten the beer’s pulse—something
had him give up. At a park bench, he buried it in snow
like a bone. To the double take of a passing suit—nailed,
no doubt, by the malt funk—I said, “Gotta keep it cool.”

Guards frisked us for secrets. My gaze grabbed my dad’s.
His broke quick as a twig. Still, I rubbed it in—chuckling.
“See what I mean?” A long elevator of stares, then a hall 
whose flicker would wobble anyone, filed us into a room.
Elizabeth edged in along the wall, clung to a lady’s hand.

A beer smooch sent Elizabeth hiding beneath the table.
The worker looked me down in my arctic-camo hoodie.
Her head shook as if over the stink, over the whole job—
eyes on her watch. My dad coaxed “Liz Bean” to his lap.
I took photos while she colored, shooting me flirty eyes.

Grandpa was idling curbside when we exited. He said
“Nope” to the park despite my dad’s “I dropped money.”
Perhaps hoping to fix what he never would, soon my dad
changed his tune—agitating garbage in theater. “Got it—
other pocket.” For the trip he bought them their Win4.

* “Visiting Elizabeth” originally appeared in Flapperhouse (2016)