Becky's Questions

My daughter’s chin tilts like a marionette
who seeks the secrets of her human maker.
Though I don’t hold her strings, I spin a net
of answers for her future; may it break her
fall, if on her newfound legs she flails
towards the sheer drop from life’s polished boards.
I braid a rope to throw her if that fails,
twine facts with love to make the strongest cords.

She asks me when I’ll let her tread the stage
alone, but she still finds it hard conceiving
time much longer than six years – her age.
(I still have double that to finish weaving.)
We need those years to tiptoe, not to fly.
I clip time’s wings; she asks if spiders cry.

Previously appeared in The Lyric




Index Of Published Poems