I am the man in the play-
ground, the cord of his earbuds
clenched in his teeth
(bit in a horse’s mouth)
so the mic’s closer to his
voice, so his lover
can hear him above the end-
less screams. His daughter
(my daughter!)
plays behind him, wild now on
the monkey bars. Every-
thing is as it should
be. In a week he will travel to
Florida & his lover will meet him
there. She
has heard his daughter grow
up—two, three, four—
& she will even end up watching
her, when it turns out he has
no childcare in Florida—
the two of them will build sandcastles
& collect shells while he works &
that night his daughter will give him
a drawing, all of them—wife,
lover, daughter, him.