by Lucinda Watson
When I was 29 and carrying a daughter I dreamt you made me fly with you again. This time we took the old 1923 Breezy Biplane that you had paid a “small fortune” for. I sat in back: A perfect view of your neck lines: road maps of unattained destinations, unsatisfied longings, angry firebreaks cut into a surface of skin. Turning repeatedly, you yelled over your shoulder, forcing me to listen as you flew over barns, houses with windows, happy families that angered you and made me wistful. I wished for a parachute but then I always did hearing all the ways I had failed you as a daughter. Up ahead there was an open barn that you spied late in the ride, gleefully pointing it out to me. “Watch! I can fly right through that barn and never hit the walls!” I never doubted you and watched the wings carefully place themselves inches from the shaggy barn sides. In an instant it was over and we were flying straight up. You with your gnarled teeth bared and me with my baby.
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