Pismo

In the picnic box pool at your second apartment, you stood us on your shoulders to touch the sky

I liked most the baked bread crumbs on your stuffed tomatoes 

Repeat viewings of the Big Lebowski, and the times you left us alone

You used a perforated tan car cover on your black Chrysler 

And drank and drove from Sunnyvale to mom’s too many times to count

When we last spoke, you provided unlimited beer and microwaved steaks

They were inedible and grey

I was embarrassed by your comments, and I thought it was not how a father should be

We argued and you told me how I was the cause of the worst day of your life

I’ve stuck by my word not to talk to you again and you’ve remained silent

But in the half-inch, on either side of our nasal bones we are a match 

I want to be nothing like you but you are there like the sand at Pismo