read by

Sharon Olds


My Father's Diary
『Blood, tin, straw』

by Sharon Olds

When I sit on the bed, and spring the brass
scarab legs of its locks, inside
is the stacked, shy wealth of his print.
He could not write in script, so the pages.
are sturdy with the beamwork of printedness,
WENT TO LOOK AT A CAR, DAD IN A
GOOD MOOD AT DINNER, LUNCH WITH MOM,
TRIED OUT SOME RACQUETS-a life of ease,
except when he spun his father's DeSoto on the
ice, and a young tree whirled up
to the hood, throwing up her arms-untill
LOIS. PLAYED TENNIS WITH LOIS, LUNCH
WHIT MOM AND LOIS, DRIVING WITH LOIS,
LONG DRIVE WITH LOIS . And then,
LOIS! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! SHE IS SO
GOOD, SO SWEET, SO GENEROUS, I HAVE
NEVER, WHAT HAVE I EVER DONE
TO DESERVE SUCH A GIRL? Between the tines
of his W's, and liquid on the serifs, moonlight,
of self of the grown boy pouring
out, knelling in pine-needle weave,
worshiping her. It was my father
good, it was my father greateful,
it was my father dead, who had left me
these small structures of his young brain-
he wanted me to know him, he wanted
someone to know him.