I’m teaching this night class for adults on contemporary San Francisco poets. My father’s dying and someone’s asking me if this poem’s a sonnet. My father’s dying or already dead. My father’s dying and why didn’t I cancel class? My father’s dying and I teach every one of my classes even this night class and after that I finally show up at the airport. Yes I could’ve gotten an earlier flight. My father’s dying and there are a lot of debts but I don’t know that yet. My father’s dying and I’m going to be his executor but I don’t know that yet. My father’s dying and his stepdaughter who works at the Crazy Chicken is going to sue the estate and the estate is going to mean me but I definitely do not know that yet. My father’s dying and the Crazy Chicken is what my father called the White Hen Pantry. My father’s dying and it’s too late to correct anything. The White Hen Pantry went out of business years ago. My father’s dying and he used to take me to Dunkin’ Donuts on Saturday mornings where I used to get a chocolate-coconut. My father’s dying and I’m at SFO and I don’t remember much of that. My father’s dying and I’m flying a redeye that’s all I know. My father’s dying and do I feel like I have some special status flying last-minute toward my dying father? Yes. My father’s dying and everyone’s father dies. Yes they do. My father’s dying and everyone’s sleeping. My father’s dying and am I congratulating myself on making this trip across country? My father’s dying and this guy’s not sleeping he’s watching The Hangover Part III. My father’s dying and I’m watching The Hangover Part III. I put in my earphones and I’m listening. My father’s dying and now I often get chocolate-coconuts and I’d like a chocolate-coconut now and is this plane already landing? My father’s dying and here I am and in that I have succeeded. It’s morning. My father’s dying so we probably have to re-think the word “succeed.” My father’s dying and I’m in Logan and it’s familiar even though I don’t recognize anything. My father’s dying and he’s getting off every plane. My father’s dying and for a long time he’ll be driving every car and riding every bus but I don’t know that yet. My father’s dying and he’s coming out of the men’s room. My father’s dying and people are walking around here without their shoes. My father’s dying without his shoes. No that’s not him being searched. My father’s dying and there he is standing in line at Dunkin’. Any minute he might turn around. My father’s dying and any minute he might call me. My father’s dying and he’s the only one of us who says my name using three syllables. My father’s dying and maybe he didn’t get tired of all the syllables because he said my name so infrequently. I got tired. My father’s dying and he liked to stretch out my name in his mouth isn’t that romantic? My father’s dying and is it important to remember now that I hated the way he said my name? No. Is it important to think about that tone of voice? No. Is it important to remember that tone at all? No forget it. My father’s dying and now I can only hear my name said correctly by strangers in Italy or France or when I scan it for my students and is that fair? BRIT-tan-y. What is that? I say. And they say, it’s a dactyl. My father’s dying and I’ll wait in line at this Dunkin’ in Terminal B saying my name like a dactyl. The line is enormous. If your father’s dying you should get to cut the line. Move over. My father’s dying so no more black coffee for him. No more Crazy Chicken cup no more Dunkin’ Donuts cup when it was still paper before everyone went Styrofoam then paper then Styrofoam again. Never mind about the landfills. My father’s dying and am I still waiting in line when my mother and my brother and my brother’s wife and my brother’s kid are all out there at the curb? My father’s dying and who cares give me the Styrofoam. Do I really want to stop and feel grown up for paying for the expensive-as-shit last-minute redeye and getting myself this coffee so I wouldn’t be a zombie when I go pull the plug? Is “zombie” really a word you want to use right now? No. My father’s dying and I’m managing my rollie bag and my shoulder bag and this coffee through the revolving door like a champ. My father’s dying and is it OK or not OK to say “pull the plug”? My father’s dying and I’m repeating pull the plug pull the plug pull the plug all the way through this revolving door. My father’s dying and I’m standing on the curb. My father’s dying and I’m thinking about a shower. My father’s dying and is it OK to think about a shower on the way to pull a plug? My father’s dying and here’s my brother putting my bag in the truck bed. Hello hello. Can you believe this? We cannot believe this. My father’s dying and we must go directly. We must go directly to pull the plug. My father’s dying and now there’s only one quick car ride left. My father’s dying and under the harbor we go. Under the ground we go. My father’s dying and Mass General is the place of some bad memories for all of us and let’s not think about that. And how the cold wind does blow. My father’s dying and some of us are about to make another bad memory and is that fair? It stings your toes and bites your nose and oh here we are in the parking garage. My father’s dying and for years I had nightmares about whatever’s happening inside those revolving doors. My father’s dying in there but my brother did not die in there. Just remember that for a minute OK? That was twelve years ago OK? Remember that. My father’s dying and I know exactly how much this parking garage used to cost and look how much it is now. Rip-off, my brother says. My father’s dying and my brother’s driving the truck up and up. Now thirty dollars is fifty dollars. People are sick in there and is fifty dollars fair? No. This parking garage should be paying us. People are dying. My father’s dying and one night twelve years ago he paid for my parking. Yes I remember that. Sure I had a credit card. This is one of the best memories I have of my father. My father is dying and I want to remember it.
It’s fall it’s getting dark. It’s late afternoon it’s winter. I come out he’s going in we’re both coming out. It’s already dark it’s dusk it’s almost morning. My brother is maybe dying in there his son is maybe dying in there. It’s getting light it’s not-quite light it’s already daylight it’s morning. My father approaches me I approach my father my father and I come outside together through the revolving doors. Here’s forty dollars. Here’s his wallet here’s my hand his hand he holds out the money. I take it. The day is better he says the day is worse I say you’ll see when you get in there you’ll see what I mean. My father is just arriving I’ve been here all night I’m just arriving. My father and I are leaving together. We’re in the garage. We’re riding the elevator. We’re side by side looking straight ahead. We’re parked on different floors and one of us is getting off first. We’re saying goodbye goodbye. We’re hugging we never touch. We say I love you we say nothing.
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Excerpt from Executrix by Brittany Perham, reprinted by permission of the University of Georgia Press. © 2026 Brittany Perham. Executrix is the winner of the 2025 Sue William Silverman Prize for Creative Nonfiction, part of the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) Award Series.
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