I WON’T PRETEND THAT SHAWN
was the kind of guy who was home by curfew.
The kind of guy
who called and checked in
about where he was,
who he was with, what he was doing.
He wasn’t.
Not after eighteen,
which was when our mother
took her hands off him, pressed them together, and
began to pray
that he wouldn’t go to jail that he wouldn’t get Leticia pregnant
that he wouldn’t die.