For Jack

We had fish & they circled around
in tanks in our dark cellar
now more than 20 years on
I hardly remember them

but back them I remembered them
swimming in the years our father lived with us
& through the beatings, screaming and nervous tension
they swam in our basement
sealed in tanks & silence

When my father left
or when the fish died
I don't remember really

I do remember the empty tanks
where once swam life
& I have driven by the house
with that same sense of remembrance

Years later, my mother told me
that the one fishes name was Jack
well I never remembered that
& I wish I never rememebred
my father either.