Daughtership has this distance.
Like parallel lines, like the octave.
Something made at once becoming
unmade each moment—it recedes
with the hours into shadow. That presence
of shadow, the press of it. Can you see?
Daughtership is full of these contours binding
the shape of upsurging light. Like water,
it throws itself and rushes through fabric
then fades into nothing. But even light
has its strict edge, frames woven threads.
A daughter's watchfulness like gathered-up hurry,
the feeling of newfound certainty. How the body
forestalls. How the stars pulverize the sky.
How being here must be separate from there,
and only because of it. Because hands,
clasped or hidden, and the ready eyes
swell forward like the bending curve
of a question, a curious nod, toes that turn
into themselves—all this careful sifting out,
being still. Like standing in a foyer always
on the brink of leaving. How impermanent
that private hesitation, then startled open
when suddenly someone enters the room
and says, hello, little darling, the voice almost tender.