P.P.S.

My daughter has an assignment to find song lyrics that describe who she is, so we are now listening to as much of her iPod as will fit in one evening. The assignment reminded me of a poem that I wrote for her years ago. I read it to her tonight.

A Love Poem


She, my soliloquy,
anomaly, chips at packed earth
with a dull trowel discovered
in the emerald surf of unclipped grass
that has swallowed her ankles.
She is three and harbors visions
of princesses in the forest,
gowns resplendent with jewels,
fingers gladdened
by dime-store finery.
She would live in a tree,
bathe in the rain
and eat apples with honey.
She would knock down leaves
to carpet the drab duff,
then pirouette past the peeling limbs,
the ripening fruit,
the other princess trees.
Royalty knows its desires
and she shuns the queens' lapis lazuli,
digs instead for marbles
the color of tropical frogs,
for sharks under the garden.
We can find them, she says,
if we go far enough.
An ocean swells beneath the hellebore,
a sea of shimmering silver and green
for my glimmery fish,
my under-the-surface girl.

"A Love Poem" previously appeared in Pontoon Number One.