coming out to my father

By Caitie L. Young

it’s like this: my father is smothered 

by the same soot as always; he 

doesn’t build fires, but he likes to 

stand around them and watch the smoke.

i came out to my mother over the phone 

in aisle 7 at a meijer grocery store after i 

was dumped through text message; i was 

hoping she would put out her cigarettes on 

my skin the way she did when i was younger, 

and pick all the same places so every old 

scar would reopen—that way i wouldn’t 

feel the heartache, i would only feel the 

burning because after so long the burns 

stop hurting and the pain feels normal, 

and i only wanted to feel normal again, 

but she said she didn’t care if i was gay 

and that they always sorta knew, and she 

said she would tell my father for me

if i had wanted her to.

i told her to say it like this: it’s like

watching my whole life go up in flames, 

but i am the one who lit the match and i’m

not just standing to feel the heat or watch 

the flames swallow the room; being queer

is becoming a serial arsonist, it means 

i’m learning ashes have a variety of uses, 

so i’m going to save the ashes and polish 

silverware and make soap, amend the soil 

in my garden, and tell him i said that’s the 

thing about setting your life ablaze—when 

the last flame dies, i won’t watch how the 

smoke tastes the sky, but i’ll learn from the 

ashes how to rebuild my life. 

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Caitie L. Young (she/they) is a poet and fiction writer in Kent, Ohio. They graduated from Kent State University with a B.A in English; their poems have appeared in Luna Negra, Welter online at the University of Baltimore. They are also the first-place recipient of the 2020 and 2021Wick Poetry Undergraduate Scholarship.