Still here

I notice it first in my right shoulder.
It's not pain. More like a readiness that never fully rests.
I breathe into it, but it doesn't relax.
It watches.

It's not only mine.
That shoulder carries years of learning what it means to be a man:
to stand guard,
to keep shape,
to protect from whatever might spill out if I soften too much.

My father was not one for rules or structure.
His father's hand had been iron, and he wanted to offer air.
In loosening the grip, he let go of touch.
Two men turning away, afraid of what staying might make of them.

Even now, my training in psychotherapy seems to trouble him.
He holds his breath, as if exhaling might let something in.
He changes the subject.
Small talk as shelter, as mercy.

I wonder if this is how men have always spoken.
My grandfather's iron, my father's air, my body keeping watch.
Each of us faithful to distance.
Each of us longing to return.

When people speak of masculinity and femininity, I drift.
Those words smell of dust and trapped air.
I feel unquestionably male,
and I want the window flung open.

And yet,
when I picture a man who is tender, open, and relational,
something in me still names him feminine.

As if empathy itself had a gender.
As if the heart spoke in two tongues.

Maybe that's because I'm attracted to men.
I carry a lifetime of scripts telling me that men like me are softer, lighter, more sensitive:
feminine.
Sometimes I play along, sometimes I rebel.
Either way, I'm moving in the shadow of a man who never existed.

I chased that shadow for years.
It kept me moving.
Many of us learnt how to leave without looking like we're leaving.
A smile, a story, a sigh, a silence.
A posture handed down through generations.

Sometimes, when I notice my impulse to withdraw, I think of my father.
I used to rage against it.
Now I feel the ache beneath it.
The weight of it sits right here, in my shoulder.

The impulse still comes.
My shoulder lifts, my neck tightens, my breath thins to a thread:
a body rehearsing its oldest defence.

Then comes the choice.
My body turns to leave, but my heart stays:
with a client, a friend, my unease.

This, perhaps, is the work of men now:
to stay when everything in you was trained to leave.
To hold, not contain.
To steady, not still.
To shelter, not shield.

Sometimes, when I notice I'm holding my breath, I think of my father.
The impulse remains, and so do I.
Still here.