We are
Daughters of Life’s Dance
Our mother at sixteen
leaves high school
at the end of the ninth grade
She is pregnant.
A waltz of missteps
a round of wooden
stick horses
Requests for hugs
and touches of the clear
crystal lake
that echo
our grandfather’s
national broken record
in backstroke
at her same age
of sixteen
We call him PawPaw
A kind and gentle human
who does no wrong
who teaches himself
seven languages
and rescues our mother
a child bride
his child
over and over
again
And when he can do
no more
our Uncle Tim
steps in to rescue her
over and over
Amen to our bloodline
the Great Spirit
of the
Irish legions
of humanity
and the
Eastern Cherokee Nation.
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