OUT of the WOODS (Excerpt 2)

Looking now at this smiling kid in the photo I see a longing in the eyes.

It’s still my face. I still look like that.

I feel just like that

and now here come the tears

never far away

always lapping near the shoreline.

There was never a real resting place.

I was always on high alert.

Now I am getting angry and my head is going numb. When this begins to happen I just lose it but I
can’t let that happen here.

Not in this place.

I am thinking again about that old question.

If he is my real dad why didn’t he come and help me?

Why did I have to go through all that?