My sister at two is found standing naked
on the back porch with an unlit cigarette
dangling from her lips. She shits in my shoe—
she says because I wouldn’t pay her any mind.
Probably true, my memories of her more cloud
than rain. But how would she remember.
My second daughter claims to remember events
before she was born, so who is to know.
I feel a twitch of pain, an evening at Ford’s
Theater—the world turns. Do we share
memory with atoms in the air—
At four my sister decides to run away.
She packs a bag and heads out the door,
down the street. We wave goodbye,
and she collapses on the pavement and cries—
|