Oh Heavenly Father, his bones are cold,

His skin is stretched tight across his skull,

Thin golden locks of hair have fallen onto the cream colored silk pillow of his eternal bed

no longer rooted in his scalp.

He rots in festered enzymatic fluids and mold,

Consumed by the biological processes of decomposition,

All the while trapped inside his tight little box

six feet underneath the grassy turf of the family cemetery.

He succumbed to death's shadow six years ago,

Peacefully sleeping and unaware that his body had given up,

Having followed his long ago abandoned ambition for life

limping along in the misery of your illusion passed down for countless generations.

He died earlier than when we found him in his bed, though,

Unmoving and cold, without breath or reflex to human touch,

No, he died many years beforehand,

Having nailed himself next to the cross of your Son.

On the day he sacrificed himself for your child,

He sacrificed his own will to live,

Struggling with depression, life threatening cancers,

Failed marriages and religious adherence.

He was only 46 years old,

Stuck in a rut of constant hope and prayer,

Convinced the suffering was for a purpose,

not realizing his purpose was in front of him everyday and the suffering wasn't necessary.

He could have seen it too if he weren't so blinded by eternal aspirations,

He would have seen it in the trace of her similarly shaped red lips,

Her matching crystal blue eyes

and her awkward sense of humor that mirrored his own so eerily.

He could have been resurrected in the life he already had

Recognizing how purposeful life truly is

Instead of throwing away his own child for a made up life in Heaven

That he head no proof of being real.

His daughter was very real.

But he threw away his life

He tossed aside the idea of being purposeful through parenting,

Because just like Jesus, he wanted to leave a legacy of tragedy to be remembered by.

His bones are cold

But he doesn't need the extra covers anymore.

His daughter is cold,

But he wanted to fulfill your selfish desire for adoration instead.

Adoration of a being who would always have everything it desires,

Despite his meager contribution of reverence,

And he will have the scorning of a child

who will never have the one thing that could have been definite in her life.