Carol Berg

C a r o l   B e r g

So Words Have Power To Open The Father 

Father, what breaks windows to thin air? 

I have no memory. Father, I woke, dazed, 

to pare potatoes into cool white ovoids. I sit in a stupor, 

Father. Father, the fire was oddly satisfying. I took 

a pair of silver-plated scissors. I am somewhere in me. 

Father, very few people do this anymore. Father, you threw 

confusion into the clan. Fathers fumbling, fathers retreating. 

Fathers with light yellow-green eyes of goats. Father, 

the crossing was terrible. 

All lines, including title, found in Sylvia Plath’s diary with the word Father added.