my dad makes batteries that power a death machine 

hundreds a day through his hands. he says the conveyer belt 
is a dream of tongues. of a language none of us
learned to speak. the machine has never drank enough.
in a sense my father is the machine. his fingers 
placing caps & wires. his throat like a water slide
into a pool of pears. sometimes i go into the factory
disguised as a dead bird. the men laugh about 
the life of a hamster wheel. sweat turns to milk.
the miracle of transforming their blood into a charge.
stacks & stacks of batteries. they make batteries 
for the military which is another way of saying
they make batteries for death. for killing. inside each one 
my father touches is a tiny replica of himself.
he is running from an unnamable gone-ness.
the house as a sighing field of grass. there is so much
to lose & so little to keep. the factory tests his blood
for lead. the factory gives him a day off in which 
he vacations inside every battery he's ever made.
wakes up screaming. a rocket fired into fathers. 
those fathers telling him they see the lighting 
& it was his. the machine that demands every joint.
every breath & muscle & night. he returns 
to the factory like a prodigal son. the line starts.
the other men feed the furnace pieces 
of their fingers. tip of the tongue. he does
the same. broken again. each time astonished at
how many fragments he had to scatter.