My father sits in the back yard in a rusty lawn chair.
I am ten years old and growing hungry.
I stand at his side.  His beer.
The way he exhales after each gulp. The rumble
and slosh as it hits his stomach, as though it were
untying some sort of knot. 
I hate him here. Like this.
There is nothing that he can hear. 
I watch him blink slowly, like a cow. 
“We’ll order pizza” he grumbles, nodding
his head, as though he were answering every question
that itches in the back of my throat.
And his breath pushes the sun behind the balding
trees. He turns his face back toward the
house, scanning the windows for my mother, I know
again that he has forgotten she
doesn’t live here anymore. “Hold this, son” he
slurs, extending to me
   One silver can. A sharp splinter of
moon pricks itself through the roof of our house.
He closes his eyes for one long second, his face
to the trees in drunken meditation. 
Here, somewhere between day and night, he puts
his arm around my shoulder for the long walk back.

.