Paul Vanni
You told me the day I moved in
with you that you’d drag me
screaming and kicking into
adulthood; those first months, after
arguments you’d put the leashes
on the two dogs, storm out
the front door. I lost count of how
many times you did that; it stopped
when we moved into a new apartment.
There came a time when I wished once,
just once, I’d had the guts to change
the locks on the doors after one of
those times you walked out on me,
but yours was the only name on the lease.
There was the cartoon you taped to the
bathroom mirror, insinuating I loved
baseball more than you, you who
started telling me more than once that if
I had a problem living with you, I could
go back to live in my mother’s basement.
You flaunted your high I.Q., used it
to intellectualize isolating me from
old friends you said didn’t care.
You dragged me into adulthood, only I
didn’t scream or kick, except that one
morning when just that once I kicked the
bathroom door as I gathered toothbrush and razor,
the late spring morning I evicted myself, walking
out the front door, leaving you with the dogs
you loved more than me, went to the nearby library,
searched newspaper ads, looking for an apartment,
knowing that I would make it on my own.