It was, of course, after the pastor said
that emotional memory can make up details that seem to fit the feeling we felt,
and after you confided in me all about your power to cave-
how you are her sane and grace, while she’s stuck irrational,
but you understand- because I understand! I always understand.
So I told my husband how she’d just been fooled.
Yes, was after all this I walked in sun’s shining daze,
and I couldn’t even feel all the anger I’d held
over that lone memory trapped inside my mind
that I suddenly had always known was a lie,
until people outside asked me, ‘What do you know
of daddy issues?’ I said, ‘I can fight a man off of me!
And I will always know what understanding looks like,
because I’m the kind of masochist who looked him in the eye,
forced to let him kiss my hand.’