Silent Queen
You sit in your majestic tower
Of the tree house, your brown hair gleaming down
Your strength and integrity bound
So deeply within you
Never did I notice,
Apt to the silence of your manner,
How greatly you tried
Your effort denied
Silently.
It’s funny the way one can live
So within their own space
They forget
That interacting is also receiving
When we were young
I was the one to run
To climb the trees
Steal all the Popsicles from the freezer
Soil my hands and stain my shirts with blackberries
To be the teaser
And you would change my shirt, save me from a beating
Accept my ferocity
And wipe the blood from me
You weren’t the one
To fight away the demons
You were the one
To keep them at bay
With silent protests for a better day
When we got old
And wrinkled,
Just a little.
When I hid my face
And you did
Age with grace
I noticed then
How ample you were
How you held yourself
With a profound rooting
To the earth
How grounded
And stable you had been
And the regret washed through me of the times
I secretly was ashamed
Of the way you walked
And how dissonant I thought you were
And so at a party a group of us sat sipping wine
And mocking the time
Across the table I heard you laugh
And never did I notice your voice before
And I could see between the lines
You
As you
And me
As me
Afterwards I laughed
I cried
At my new realization
What a burden I was
To you
So wild
And carefree
But what struck me was
That you held me
Just Like I was still a little girl
And I was making a fool of myself
But Still
You shushed me to sleep
A grown woman
And right before I closed my eyes
a final tear
For good
You whispered
How jealous you were
Of my experimental whirl
Eating life in
Like sauce on my fingertips
And I told you how jealous I had been
Of the way you wore long skirts
And wrapped your arms to your chest
Always knowing what you wanted
No need to want more
To explore
And like two old witches
Or sisters
We laughed
Until the moon was gone
And the sunlight streamed through
Our cauldron
Bubbling to the brim
With the new strength found within
Rejoicing we found
We are each in the air
Yet solidly,
implanted on the ground.