Nicole Cartwright Denison

Another Poem about Mothers & Daughters

Investigate: her crêpe eyes

needle me silently, survey the length of my hair, my hem:

this twin only in the birthmonth of May—

more at: the sad halving of aspirations;

degrees never granted;

denied applications to AT&T

if it weren’t for you

(a woman schooled in petty and mean).

How is it a diploma prods the interloper:

subtle letters acquiesce before,

after a name. Fetched from the fold

into pages with the distinct smell of must,

of advantage swaddled in spare tutelage.

Predispositions of environment, nurture: sparring, insular.

Rumor surrenders, perceived snubs

tumble toward crypts, recessive,

percussive. No reason to remember names

in yearbooks, reunions of same-haired

women. Look at her now.

Gone to pot. . .

Promptly, I ignore the origin.

Later, she’ll compliment me, by means of her curious technique,

ruthlessly hedging as to husbands and crops,

recipes we once tried, the letdowns of each,

every time explicitly meaning the opposite—

mull the lurking chimera

at the surface of shared skin.

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