When my daughter asks me to French braid her hair
I will smile with my eyes and tell her
to sit criss-cross applesauce on her bedroom carpet,
letting silk tresses flow down her back,
beckoning to be weaved into everything
I still do not know
how to tell her

I will paint her the colors of the past
upon the beaming canvases of her eyes,
the colors of Matisse, and Monet,
Rembrandt’s best,
I will teach her to find devotion
in the security of her own skin,
music in the way she weeps quietly to herself
when she gives away all her love
to a world who cannot accept it

And one day,
long after the braids have been released,
I will wipe away her tears and tell her
that the masquerade is over,
that sometimes, baby girl,
the festivities will hush
but the carnival always comes
around again in the summer

She nods
with inherited apprehension,
she does not believe me

Darling, my darling,
you do take after your mother
after all