Merciel

He climbs onto my shoulders like I’m his titan.
He steers me in the right direction
with constant detours toward the toy section.
Little hands break my faux-hawk style
and give me bed-head despite
not touching the mattress since he left his.
My racoon eyelids hide beneath the glow
I get whenever he speaks his five-year-old dialect.
Even though he strains my neck, my back
has never stood as firm
before I fought to protect him against pitbulls
and bullish parents who bite and poke
to try to shape him into a well-behaved,
medically tranquil, spiritually wrangled model citizen
like generations of men who knew discipline and respect
and still enslaved nations and murdered the rest.
I block their volleys. I won’t shock him off me
even when he’s running on walls
I remain beside him, guarding
his journey through the frontier.