What I remember most

about my father’s apartment

are the empty off-white walls

and the television on the floor

of a room with no furniture.

Also: seditious whispering,

war plans tucked under mattresses,

muffled manifestos through thin walls.

For a long while you will feel

like paper shreds on the floor,

like a cycloning weathervane.

There is no avoiding this part.

But when you rise, and rise

you shall, it will be on steps

formed from hardened wisdom,

crystallized by midnight heart murmurs:

not all things joined by God

can be separated by man.