Lannie Stabile
Hi, Lonely. I'm Dad.
Excerpt
Whiskers
"I hated facial hair...but it grew on me."
I wonder if his face would be smooth as the stones I
often pocketed to show him. Or if, even though I hated
it, he would run his rough cheek along mine, the facial
hair chafing. He possessed not a single crowning hair,
but
maybe he would grow a thick, dark ducktail to atone. It
seems irreverent, however, to hang a hat on how I grew
up without a whiskered, grinning jaw of a father. An on-
us thrust upon a sad stranger, a man who never knew me.
"I hated facial hair...but it grew on me."
I wonder if his face would be smooth as the stones I
often pocketed to show him. Or if, even though I hated
it, he would run his rough cheek along mine, the facial
hair chafing. He possessed not a single crowning hair,
but
maybe he would grow a thick, dark ducktail to atone. It
seems irreverent, however, to hang a hat on how I grew
up without a whiskered, grinning jaw of a father. An on-
us thrust upon a sad stranger, a man who never knew me.
About the Author
Lannie Stabile (she/her), a queer Detroiter, is the winner of OutWrite’s 2020 Chapbook Competition in Poetry and a back-to-back semifinalist for the Button Poetry Chapbook Contest. Lannie was also named a 2020 Best of the Net finalist. Her debut poetry full-length, Good Morning to Everyone Except Men Who Name Their Dogs Zeus, was published in 2021 by Cephalopress. In 2022, look out for her fiction debut, Something Dead in Everything (ELJ Editions). Find her on Twitter @LannieStabile or @NotALitMag, where she throws random writing contests and open mics.
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