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Poetry

Before the hospital, Eve pulled free each plant
in her garden and set it by its empty
nest. Then she washed their roots clean. I have to
believe this meant she loved them. She never tried
to learn what they were-just watered them.
While in Eve’s first three weeks there were as many
diagnoses. In week four, her birth records
came from the courts and revealed another name.
redacted name————:something I have never called her.
I was not allowed inside, so I pressed my
palm to the glass; my lifeline, written over
by lattice. Eve, my sister; my sister, Eve.
How is it those birds in the garden keep on with
their calling, when everything in it is known?

 


Julia McDaniel earned her MFA from the Helen Zell Writers’ Program at the University of Michigan. She lives in Providence, Rhode Island.

 

 

 

Photo by Timothy Dykes on Unsplash

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