a week before my dad died

he asked if he could borrow twenty bucks 
i said no 

it’s taken me twenty years to forgive myself 

a week after my dad died 

a man told me he had seen a black spectre 
hovering over my dad’s body 

it’s taken me twenty years to forgive him 

a month after my dad died 

my stepmother skipped town 
without paying her share of the funeral bill 

it’s taken me twenty years to bury hate

along with forgiveness 
in the shallow ground 

of my dad’s unmarked grave 
that i couldn’t afford 

at seventeen.

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Leilani Tamu is a poet and creative nonfiction writer from Tāmaki Makaurau. She has published two books—The Art of Excavation (2014) and Cultural Diplomacy (2017)—and is now developing her first play.