bath toy

i love a tiny day where
i get as small as i can & try
to find a monster to look at me.
in the bath tub i feel like
a rubber duck, guts full of
bright water. the tub becomes 
a lake & we are paddling &
you are holding me in the palm
of your hand. it is terrifying
to get older mostly because you notice
not only how small you are
but how small everyone else is too.
i have once found my dad as 
a bath toy too. i shut the curtain.
no need for a shower today i have had
enough embarrassing moments
for a lifetime. i learned that none
of them know how to tell each other,
"i am hurting." so the wounds become
lakes. becomes tributaries that snake
all around our bodies. i find myself
as a blood vessel & sometimes just
a leaf stuck to the driveway. i crave
the smallness though. to be taken
on an exhale. i look for monsters 
because i want to believe someone
is big enough to pocket me. to crush me
in one move. a thumb to my back.
instead, the world is shrinking.
i got invited to a war criminal's house
& he was shorter than my father. 
less coarse too. i believe he is probably
smaller than me when all the lights
go out & the magnifying glasses 
stop kissing his feet. the realization
was comforting & terrible. when i say
"monster" i do not mean evil.
i mean god please let there be someone
who can swallow me whole. there are
less monsters the older i get. i have
to go to the mountains to find them.
i lay face up in the bath. lose my smallness
to the thunderstorm outside. remember
being a child & how my mom would 
tell us not to be in the bath when
a storm came. me, no longer a bath toy.
just a boy in a bowl of soup. the storm
throws spoons at the pavement.