My Therapist

After Scott Hightower’s “My Father”

is a lukewarm coffee spill.
My therapist is the graphite tip dulled.
My therapist is the chewed eraser.

My therapist is a junkyard,
an eroding opinion, rosed cheeks,
a half-sealed envelope, a saturated ice cream cone.

My therapist is kindling and unfed
fire. My therapist wears overalls.
He wears sparse words.

My therapist owns a chess board missing
a knight. My therapist owns interrupting
run-on sentences. He told

me yesterday to breathe. My therapist
is a painting, a paint-by-number,
a paintbrush, a paintball, a painter

with a stained hand. He admires forehead
wrinkles. He admires unsharpened questions.
He collects snow globes. My therapist is

a NASCAR fan. Told me to learn how to
depreciate Mondays. My therapist is cold turkey,
unclean breaking. My therapist is a polished

penny, tail-side sideways. He enjoys eating
tiramisu. He enjoys people-watching people.
My therapist is Panopticon.

He is soft lines, enunciated. My therapist enjoys large
amounts of small talk. He enjoys still frames. Because of him, I don’t
double-check, triple-check, checkmate.

Because of him, I unclose my
eyes. Because of him, I don’t see purpose
in duct-taped umbrellas. Because of my therapist,

I use the bench press spotter-less.
Because of my therapist, I dislike journaling.
Because of my therapist, I draw hearts on both sleeves.