i’ll be 33
in 3 days, and today
i am drinking coffee
that promises undertones of citrus and hibiscus
and uses words like “alchemy”
in their copy. my daughter, claire, is 6 –
just turned
2 months 2 days ago. she spins
her buckwheat
honey blonde hair up
and thumbs a $1 comic from the shop
2 doors down.
issue 4 of 6.
The Emerald City of Oz. at the comic shop
i tell her
the later Oz stories
were all so much better than the first.
ozma, tick-tock, the sawhorse.
stories richer, characters more fleshy and fanciful
all at once.
earlier saturday morning we walk outside
to the perfect silence of snow falling
before our college age neighbors have woken up.
today is long past due.
a “mommy-daughter” date that i promised myself
would happen
once every week.
they have not.
we’re a blended family. is that the right term?
i don’t think it is.
mother father son
daughter (from a previous relationship, from a horrible relationship, one of those
relationships that women say “escape” or “got away from” when describing later
in life).
we have dropped
the technicalities by now.
and claire is my partner’s daughter
as much as mine.
we do not qualify
“a previous relationship.”
our family tree is small
thick. it bears for us
flowers and fruit
and wood that smells
like palo santo
before it meets the flame.
but it grew out of the soil
that claire and i
tilled, tended,
our 3 years alone.
our 3 years together.
Practical Redemption 
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