A poem about not missing a father

Some of our fathers couldn't be pleased. Some didn't pay attention. Some drank either to cope or forget and then forgot to return. Some left in other ways. Either by death or by choice. People who say they have few issues with their fathers and are happy with them are so beyond my line of experience. I've come to liken the word "father" with pain.

of having a father more than I miss the actual man, for any mention of him just opens a can of worms I rarely want to face. So here I am trying to work through it all. And as so many do, I'm attempting it through poetry. Enjoy it or embrace it or feel it or relate. Whichever. Happy reading.

Through inky black ferns
in the darkness of yearn-
ings. in the night of a
daughter's last hopes.

I take myself back
to where I once knew you.
back to where I thought
I'd one day become you.

I used to wish to touch. to scrape my fingers
across your scruff and see your fluff
of a head.
Is it thinning even more?

I used to wish to see. to create a memory
of your face to my brain
from back when.
when I was your little girl.

I used to wish to hear. to have my ears stretch
at the sound of my name
when you called.
But I've lost the sound of your voice.

It's somewhere in the darkest place of my heart
where I can neither see
nor touch you
where I refuse to hear you calling.

Distance has changed
and with it separated
my yearnings.

Calling? You've never done that.
I suppose you've lost me too.