Standing here
in the doorway.
I hold my daughter close. She is incandescent;
I move to catch her, to absorb her before she is gone.
Her body incipient, delicate places I’ve embraced and loathed
the same. She is the sunrise,
the before
on the cusp of everything
that is after
eleven.
To hold my sons
is to love my husband, my father,
but to hold my daughter is to love myself; an eclipse.
In this moment, in this aurora,
I’m holding myself, as we two become three.
My mother becomes me.
And we are all standing
in the light
of
eleven.
Jessica Rinker
Jessica M. Rinker received her MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in 2014 and is a freelance writer and editor as well as a reading teacher for the Institute of Reading Development. Between teaching, reading, writing, and mothering her life is books and kids--all soul-fulfilling work. Jessica is represented by Linda Epstein of Emerald City Literary Agency, has had work published in Curious Parents Magazine and is a theater critic for patheatreguide.com. She lives with her partner, Joe McGee (also a children's author) and her sheltie, Marley, (who is not an author, but is an excellent fetcher), in Pennsylvania.
Jess, this is so lovely! Really beautiful!
Thank you, Susan!
Exquisite and tender. As a woman I really felt the love and oneness. Just beautiful!