The Rising
Poor Ezra’s Almanac/Volume 2/November 2023
Karma Comes Before/Issue 3/March 2024
She has left for the school where she works, so I turn to face her side of the bed. The pillow is shadowed, a circle of peach makeup. She doesn’t wash before sleep. I rise, remove the case to toss in the basket. Later, I will apply a special mixture learned long ago: vinegar, baking soda, lemon. I straighten the bedroom, lining up her tiny shoes, dead mice, returning her cast off clothes to boney hangers. (She is a snake, constantly shedding.) I avoid my own spare closet, the black chalice box-a gift from my dead parents-tucked high on a shelf.
A moment of peace. I kneel down beside the bed to pray.
The baby’s room is another planet, an alternate atmosphere. I am weightless here. I float. Here, I can breathe, enjoy the scents of Vaseline and powder. The light is a pink haze, puffy stars dangle overhead. The baby is beautiful, curled brown hair at her temples, pursed rosebud lips. Her body rises and falls in sleep. Behold! My daughter. My. Daughter. I rest a hand on her back to feel warmth, life, joy.
***
By 10 AM the house is sufficiently neat. The baby plays on the floor with her blocks and books while yeast proofs in a bowl of warm water. At noon, the dough rises in the oven. We eat lunch together at the kitchen table. With a steady hand I spoon pureed vegetable soup into her o-shaped mouth. Later, we stroll in the spring air. Cracked sidewalks lead to more cracked sidewalks, a palm outstretched, lines revealing mistakes, broken promises. Still, we amble under budding trees, pass small sad houses similar to ours. A stray dog follows, sniffing our trail. I resist annoyance, hold out a hand for a sniff. At the deserted playground, we glide on a rusty swing, scuff marks on sand.
On the way back, it sneaks in, a burglar through a back window: the dread of late afternoon. I attempt to untangle, smooth the jumble of dark thoughts emerging. Hail Mary, full of grace. I can’t sustain the prayer. I repeat different, well known words: Seconds lead to minutes, minutes to hours, hours to days, days to weeks, weeks to months, months to…
The baby naps. I sit hunched at the screen, bathed in computer glow. I examine a nearly empty inbox, my failed search for employment. Not so long ago I led a large parish, fielded untold questions and needs. I spent my days stretched thin between the living and the dying, an adept trapeze artist, balancing, flying, falling.
***
She arrives home at 3:30 PM, begins unravelling the peace I built throughout the day. The boy, eyes covered in bangs, follows close at her heals. He doesn’t greet me, darts to his room, a chipmunk running under a bush. I will not make him a snack, help him with homework. His mother will feed him. His father will collect him for baseball practice. The boy will leave and return in silence, never once meeting my eyes.
She stands at the counter, a dividing line between us. She boils water, crackles open a package of ramen, empties it into a pot. She holds a bowl from beneath, her tongue contorting to catch noodles in her open mouth. At the table I feed little bits of bread to our daughter.
On the counter, her phone repeatedly lights. Some unknown person insists on her attention.
“Must be nice,” she snipes without prompting, “to stay home.”
“You know I’m looking,” I say.
“Look harder,” she says, mouth full.
The thought comes without any warning, becomes words. I turn away from my daughter and say them carefully, as though practiced.
“What if I take her, just go?” I prepare for the roof to crack, collapse, plaster raining down, to shield the baby with my body.
She pauses, says, “When?”
She continues to slurp strands of noodles into her mouth, worms disappearing into an unknowable tunnel. The fork seems bigger than her hand. She is a tiny, bird like person. No, she is a giant who stomps on villages, shattering everything to tiny bits. She is a storm, a hurricane. Or am I these things?
“As soon as possible?”
“Fine. Perfect.”
She finishes, abandons the bowl in a clean sink.
***
Even this last night, we share a bed. Our backs face each other, untouching. She snores. I lay awake in the darkness, my mind flashing, memory’s lightning strike, my failures shocking in the flare, diminishing into waning thunder rumbles. My daughter sleeps in the next room, the calm after the storm, an expected surprise. I watch the window for the slightest glimpse of light. Its gentle fingers reach through the blinds, striping the bed. I whisper words to myself, a mantra, a prayer: I am a father still, her father. I will always be her father.
