I wonder…

 I wrote this a while ago, but a comment that was left on previous entry got me to thinking and this piece kind of sums up why it has been so hard for me.  Recently my aunt told me something that she thought would make things easier for me to understand, but I am not sure if it did more damage than good.  My grandfather was a son of a bitch to my father.  He always made my father feel like shit, and was extremely verbally abusive.  My father was like the black sheep of the children.  So my aunt tells me that my father was the result of a one night stand that my grandmother had with another man.  My grandfather forgave my grandmother and agreed to raise my father.  I guess he thought he would be able to do it, but unfortunately for my father, he wasn’t treated like the rest of the family. My father always seemed lost and hurt.  He was such an amazing man.  All the neighborhood kids loved him.  He was funny and just the type of man people wanted to be around…when he was sober.  He was fascinated with Chinese culture and taught himself how to speak and write Chinese.  He was a computer wiz.  He held a black belt in Kung Fu.  He played the trombone and the piano, and even performed with Tito Puente.  He was also a drug abuser, an alcoholic and extremely violent toward my mother when he was under the influence of either.  I loved him more than I will ever be able to express.  There is no poem that can do my feelings justice.  His death left me with a gaping hole in my heart.  What my aunt told me explained why my father seemed so damaged, why he always felt like he wasn’t good enough, and it explained the pain in his eyes.  But it also left me with a sense of feeling lost.  Who is the man that fathered my father?  Where do I really come from?  There are family members that I realize now are not even my blood family, because I really have no connection to the man I thought was my grandfather.  My grandmother died last year and took this information to her grave.  I am so mad at her for that.

My father died alone in our apartment.  He pounded on the walls for help, but there was always chaos coming from our apartment so his cries for help were ignored.  He called me the Friday before his death and asked me to come see him because he wasn’t sure he was going to make it through the weekend.  He always cried wolfe like that.  I didn’t go.  He died on Monday.  My soul has never recovered. 

He gave me life...but left me so broken.

I wonder why you loved me

But I didn’t feel it

I wonder why you wanted to nurture me

But killed me instead

I wonder why you hit mommy

And didn’t think you were hurting me

I wonder why you stood out all night

But were too tired to read me stories

I wonder why you did God knows what drugs

When they told you

You were dying

I wonder why you drank so much

When they told you

Your liver was drowning

I wonder why I wasn’t enough Daddy

Why my pleas fell on deaf ears

I wonder who hurt you Daddy

Who caused you so much pain

I wonder what you were running from

I wonder

Did your Daddy hurt you

The way that you hurt me

I wonder

Did you think of me Daddy

When you were dying

I wonder Daddy

Was I your last thought

I wonder why I need your arms around me Daddy

More than I’ve ever needed anything before

I wonder why I can’t accept your death

I wonder all these things Daddy

Things I will never know

I wonder why

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Tags: daddy, Poetry, THOUGHTS