Fountain By Jack Westmore

Only big boys are allowed

to do that. The trick is not

to look down but straight

ahead, as if one were riding

a bicycle hands-free.

Big boys don’t get wee

on their hands, they know

how to shoot straight too.

I learned this early pissing

at the urinal.

When my dad visited Heaven

in the 1980s he told me

he saw mirrors in the john,

as if the penis might want

to face itself as it did its dirty

work. There are no mirrors

nowadays (alas), but sometimes

the kids who were big enough

might stretch and stand on

tiptoe, as if trying out for Giselle

in Swan Lake. I was one of those

boys once, doing my best to

reach the urinal so I could be

the same as the older men.

I’d stand upright,

unbutton my zip, and with

some exertion, and smiling

at my father, I’d piss into the

waiting ceramic lip.