that I’m not joking that it’s gone way too far
I am young and kneeling
in front of the blinking red light.
that I’ve been humiliated and disgraced
too much by you your family and your friends
I can hear my heart banging
the way it always does
that you’ve kidnapped my son
and it is kidnapping
when I get home from school
and I am alone and it is blinking.
I’m trying to behave in the most appropriate
fashion in protecting my rights but I swear
I take a deep breath and press
the button—both wanting
that I will not stop as long as I live
until there is judicial determination
and not wanting to hear your voice,
my father’s voice. I miss everything
and procedural retribution for what
you have done AT&T the CIA the government
but the fear I felt. This time it is you.
I listen closely until you hang up.
If it takes me the rest of my life
this will not be part of any game
Then, I leap up and go sneak
another episode of The Rockford Files.
Answering Machine, 1981 uses verbatim an answering machine message from that year from my father to form the core of a poem capturing my experience of being a child with a father with schizophrenia. The collaboration is between my father and me – his recorded message all those years ago and my reflections on the experience of hearing it at the age of 11.
