birthday poem: Ally, 4

Sestina* at Four

1

You say we’re a family today,

no anything can’t go wrong.

In your bright-shape dress with the bow in front,

with your sister hovering ever present,

the babies’ pale faces watch light turn

through the trees. You hunt for coins in the leaves.

2

Of all the other stars born today

you charge dangerously to the front.

Georges Seurat is 151, Britney Spears turns

29. Your fresh steps chase friends though the leaves

unmindful of painters or pop singers, nothing yet wrong

with anything you love, with anyone present

3

and yet, this is the first time you want a present

I didn’t choose myself. Today

is a green party with a pink scooter. Red was the wrong

choice, mine--now in the garage it waits for Liv to turn

two. I have to wonder what else leaves

us with every year, what moves to the front.

4

It’s enough that I feel safe today.

You still deny reality when it feels wrong

and earnestly expect to get every good present

you ask for: not greed but trust that days turn

on wheels of pasta, cheese and order. Tears are a front

that disappear like smoke when disappointment leaves--

5

almost no trace of tragedy at present

and yet few moments pass without a turn

from pitch to bright like leaves

twisting in a dark river catching light just in front

of the turn, the waterfall always in the wrong

place, and I feel its spray on my face even today

6

when everything is perfect. The cake will not turn

to dust but become part of us. The sparkle will present

itself for reckoning—your examination of green leaves

something to measure our happiness against, wrong

to stop you from conjuring tomorrow. Today

it’s flashlights in the dark, your light out front.

7

Now three is over you are ready to turn,

turn, as you leap between holidays to claim every present

good. You holler through the trees. Sudden leaves.

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*A sestina is a poem consisting of six six-line stanzas followed by a tercet (called its envoy or tornada), for a total of thirty-nine lines. The same set of six words ends the lines of each of the six-line stanzas, but in a different order each time.