Part 4 (2/2)

Before ator in the Korean War

Before ator he was an artist

Before my father was an artist he was an athlete

Before my father was an athlete he was an unhappy altar boy

That's the best I can do I think

Goddaain

Before ainst us he was an architect; lover of art

His hands I rereat white expanses of paper, rows and rows of pens and pencils and sophisticated erasers, a T-square sliding up and doire on the drafting table, his tall forns I re fro upinto ed architectural and artht, coh the spaces of other s, and in place of bedtime stories, I heard about Le Corbusier, Antonio Gaudi, Carlo Scarpa, Fu about art, slowly, a cigarette pointing toward heaven, swirls of smoke like curls of water around the sanctity of his speech I walked with water

Before ator in the Korean War

I can only go to black and white photos here When I hold them in my hand I suddenly have to face the fact of real war, and his body in it The photos have barracks and rifles and uniforms The photos have jeeps and helicopters and the landscape of the military The photos are of my father with men I never met nor ever will, men who may be dead by now, men ent to war before I was born, before Vietnam

There are two kinds of photos In the first kind each frame is filled with an extraordinary architecture - Korean Buddhist temples and shrines

The second kind carry men There is a black man who reappears in several of the photos When I hold the photos, my father isn't the abusive fuck He becomes a different story, the one he and ths he went to concerning his best friend - a black man whose name I will never know I can't remember it I was a child when these stories were told

But the stories are all about how uys would go out to eat or drink or dance when they were on leave How he'd go in and get food or beer and bring it out to the car or the curb or some vacant lot near whatever establishether

I look at the black man in the photo I wish I could talk to him Ask him questions about my father then Was he funny? Was he kind? Did he ever s scared him, or hurt hi wartime? What is a man?

My father was handsome

Before he was a soldier he was an artist

Sometimes, ere alone, I would ask my mother questions about o into the spare bedroom, pull a sobx down from the closet, sit down next topaper On the paper was a redbird A beautifully drawn - Iredbird She would smile, and keep her eyes down, and say in her soft southern drawl alirl, ”Your father won an art prize for this drawing” In the saes filled with beautiful handwriting ”I won a prize for this story”

And then she would carefully fold it all back up, put it back in the box, return it to the closet

When I hold photos of the two of the all James Dean with his rolled at the cuff deniarettes tucked in the sleeve and his lasses My mother in her 50s dresses ide skirts and her hair tied back, her lips that were red as a coca-cola can looking black in the black and white photos They were gorgeous Hollywood She was s He looked like someone a woman would fall in love with

There is another photo of hi at a picnic table He has khaki pants on and a white shi+rt The way he is sitting? His crossed legs and bad posture and long fingers running through his thick hair? His other hand wrapped around his neck so that his elbow folds softly in? He has the body language of an artist I know I married three in a row

Before my father was an artist he was an athlete

I kno to tell this story I kno to story over things

His senior year Bases loaded at a catholic school Cleveland, Ohio, the gray of pave fates Nuns and Fathers in black, black coats and boots and hats on the bodies of family members The boys on the field as beautiful as boys on a field are; strange angels Breathfroe of things Top of the ninth The board wearing its scores, though no one needs to look At theat his upper lip, and just as his arms uncoil to connect thick whack and send the little world out of the park, at that moht then the end of things rings in the boy like hope He sees college He sees leaving ho the word athlete His arms surrender His body shi+vers A cheer rises up like a chorus Everyone is a single voice Except one At thatthe action

The ho into man - he must have lookedbeautiful

That's it

That's as far as I can go

To go further into his story, it takes the air right out of ht

I do know his tongue was cut When I look at my son and think of that I think I could kill a woue

Before my father was my father he was a boy

Just a boy

Before I hated him I loved him

How To Ride a Bike WHEN I WAS 10 TO CHEER ME UP FROM MY DESPAIR OF ht ho out of the handlebars I saw hion I saw him wheel it up to the front porch I saw him kick the kickstand and let her rest Thea ht it was perhaps the reen lory Its streaasped

The thing was, however, I did not kno to ride a bike Like at all Scared ofbesides swiI'd ever , h to hide it away in the garage So when I came outside to touch the hot pink ride, beautiful as she was, all I felt was terror When s shook and ht then He ht that second

My”Mike, she doesn't knoah” in her southern drawl, but my father meant business

”C'mon,” he said, and wheeled the bike around to face the street

I felt the i of tears but followed anyway Between terror and drawing his rage, I chose terror

My father kicked up the kickstand and held the handlebars and told et on I did He pushed us forward slowly and told iant befuddle around in a way I couldn't understand, so ain like human clubs

”Goddaripped ain won I put my feet on the pedals and tried to follow the the handlebars, and walking us forward, my father said, ”Now look up and put your hands on the handle - bars I put my hands near his - they looked like a doll's hands next to the meat of a father's ”I said look up, Godda to crash”

Training wheels Weren't there such a thing? Hadn't I seen them?

I put my hands on the handlebars I looked up My feet felt retarded - like heavy rocks going up and down Then he let go of the handlebars and held on to the back of the bike Briefly I wobbled and let go and tipped over I fell knee first doard but he grabbed me by my shi+rt and lifted me upward ”Don't cry, for christ's sake,” he said ”You better not cry”

Not crying, I could barely breathe

We went through this routine up and down the street until the sun lowered I re the sun Soon it would be dark, it would be dinner time, my mother would put plates out I kne to eat dinner