The Doors Keep Opening

The sensor read me as entering

every time I drifted close enough.

Eleven minutes of that—

the doors deciding I was coming in,

me stepping back,

them closing,

me drifting forward again

without meaning to.

Inside, my father was laughing.

I could hear it through the glass,

that sound he makes now—

high and quick, like a man

who has started putting down

the heavy things not because he's healed

but because he can't remember

why he picked them up.

I've been visiting two years.

I've never stood that long outside.

The doors kept opening.

The laugh kept going.

There was nothing wrong, exactly.

That was the thing.

He sounded fine.

He sounded like he was somewhere else entirely

and the somewhere else

seemed to suit him.

I went in eventually.

He was happy to see me.

He asked if I'd eaten.