Zombie Apocalypse Now: Documentary

My father & I take turns

directing. We are terrible

codirectors—he & I both

yank the narrative

closer toward our own eye’s

insistence. He whipped

a plumbing snake across his back

then held his arms out like Christ.

I cinched shut my eyes

& refused to come home.

When is my father no longer

my father? When Christ descends

and gobbles up his flesh.

My father was a refugee,

fleeing the zombies

that war made

of  his own people.

I grab the camera

& make a short documentary

about his life.

We select an Apocalypse Now film clip,

label it fair use, and pay a voice actor

to play my father speaking so much

English. Sometimes artifice is necessary

to get closer to the real thing.

The bridge collapses

& the voice actor laughs,

reading my father’s lines.