35/10

Brushing out my daughter's dark silken hair before the mirror I see the grey gleaming on my head the silver-haired servant behind her. Why is it just as we begin to go they begin to arrive, the fold in my neck clarifying as the fine bones of her hips sharpen? As my skin shows its dry pitting, she opens like a small pale flower on the tip of a cactus; as my last chances to bear a child are falling through my body, the duds among them, her full purse of eggs, round and firm as hard-boiled yolks, is about to snap its clasp. I brush her tangled fragrant hair at bedtime. It's an old story - the oldest we have on our planet - the story of replacement

-- Sharon Olds --