My father who sits on the riverbank says,
'I got out of that fucking hole. They're like fucking ants down there.
Go to work & come home to sleep.'
Dad would rather live in poverty at Bre & take his chances at lotto.
Mum says, 'You can't take anyone up there to see him like that.'
But I love being with him.
I like sitting on the car bonnet, sipping a rum with the other blokes,
a few dogs running around,
& smoking a joint when I don't even smoke,
& checking out lotto & listening to music with my dark glasses on.
I guess I'm a bit like him.
As for his past life in Liverpool,
he says, 'I can't shake it off, it's like standing on an ants nest,
by the time you have brushed some away, thousands more
have come to take their place.'
He has always been frightened of ants.
But then something amazing happens.
My father begins to fly in his dreams & when I stay with him,
I hear him laughing in his sleep, as his body becomes lighter,
as it is lifted off the ground by these faces of light.
In his flying dreams, he shows off & thinks he's done it on his own.
But I know that at night, my dirt-poor father is lifted by angels,
into his dreams, out of his situation, of life below the poverty line.
