The Father Poem by Alexandro Johns

Before I could see him twice he crossed The Andes;
later he married in Argentine and never again returned.
I stopped the visiting to grandmother and uncles,
then we would cross in the streets without looking each other.

Already in the school my fellows asked me where was him,
the only time that secretly I start to cry for its absence.
I became another castaway from the sea of infants
looking for a nomad magician or perhaps a Puss in Boots
who don't let them back on the road.

Now I watch his photograph (the only legacy for an enemy son)
the melancholic eyes of an absent supporting actor are there
those that nobody knows if they survive.

He chases me like a Cyclops' eye of name nobody
or as imaginary ash that blowing of years can't disperse.
Sometimes at my side his ghost wanders and we walk
like two chained ones without identity under our masks.

I wonder: why I was his preferred gamete or maybe
a handful of dust chosen at random?

Although with no joy nor suffering I ignore his death
it is the petrified horizon that loads on me his endless life.
A lot of water has fallen on this invisible agony
and without memories or oblivion in a virtual grave
I keep his image as young man while I get
the deterioration of his soul in my face.