Andrew Hahn | dad/dy & the bird | Glass: A Journal of Poetry

Andrew Hahn’s work has been featured or is forthcoming in Yes, Poetry, Screen Door Review, Crab Fat Magazine, Crab Creek Review, and Lunch among others. His chapbook is forthcoming from Sibling Rivalry Press in 2020. He received his MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts.

Also by Andrew Hahn: hole in my back autophagy: rebirth when a faggot speaks up in church

May 2019

Andrew Hahn

dad/dy & the bird

my dad/dy tried to kiss me in the morning i said no stop he grabbed my bird-bone wrists & crushed them bc he knew how i liked it then he flipped me on my stomach & pulled down my pants i said no stop my phone rang i saw a bird flying outside the glass door i remembered the bird that flew into my windshield & the way its bones cracked against the machine i remembered the way my dad/dy thought he would break me & i said don’t worry you won’t break me & then he did bc he knew how i liked his hands * i could breathe again when my dad/dy crashed to the floor against the dresser & split open & bled on the carpet he said why won’t you let me love you i said i have to go & i checked my phone & saw 50 gays were dead in orlando & i cried on the way home & my dad/dy didn’t understand why what he did was wrong but i did & birds soared around my car bc it was june & all of them flew beside me

Over the last year I have been exploring the imbalance of power within older-younger gay relationships and how the older typically holds the physical, emotional, financial, and social power. I have dated a few older men, but this one in particular thought he possessed control over me; and the tension reached its peak within the the events of the piece. I am grateful “dad/dy” was not successful in this poem. As writers, we have the autonomy to tell the experiences and memories that once were out of our control and speak our truth into them. We find strength in places where others might not expect it.

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