I buy my mom flowers

instead of seeds,

though I want to buy seeds.

And plant them.

And grow a father from the soil.

And root myself

when I mourn, mourn the man 

who never raised me.

For my mother, I buy a card.

But also another

for my father. And address it 

to a ghost I swear I glimpse,

one I pray continues to haunt.

For the postage, I use tears.

And mail it off

like a letter to God. And await

and await

a reply I’ll never get.

Previously published in The Quasar Review