SQN - Sine Qua Non - Issue Two - Journal - Page 76
SINE QUA NON
always return devoid of answers. & how does one exorcise
their fear, their demon, without first knowing it by name?
The fear of one's father: Patrophobia, & that of becoming
like one's father: [ ]phobia, are so closely knit. Yin & Yang.
Intricate knots of familial scars. In both instances, a blade
hacks into the cardboard wall of a boy's happiness.
& sometimes I wonder—after the incident—the coldness of
the blade against the supple flesh of his neck—if Isaac ever
called Abraham father, without first skinning the word of its
magic—fleecing it of every semblance of warmth.
& what did he feel then, when the blade left nothing but
a bruise on his neck? When from the snare of a thicket, a ram
bleated out the cry of his salvation—fear or hatred—for
the father, or the God that asked a thing so ruthless of him?
In André Gide’s words: There are very few monsters who deserve
the fear we have of them. & so I denounce what fear,
what aphotic memories link me to that frightened kid I
once was, & not this man I am striving so hard to grow into.
& now, across the street in the green expanse of tall grasses,
A congregation of egrets—like moving white kerchiefs, keep
faithful to their work on the cattle's silken backs. How I
envy the simplicity of their white lives. Their feathered gifts.
In my experience with symbiosis, a father claws the light
out of His son, with His fists, feasts on the succulence of the
boy's smile, until he is left with a body graffitied in scars.
The father's words, sharpened like the fangs of a deadly viper.
His fist, the swift harrowing sting of the emperor scorpion.
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