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Rita Dove I am the daughter who went out with the girls, never checked back in and nothing marked my "last known whereabouts," not a single glistening petal. Horror is partial; it keeps you going. A lost child is a fact hardening around its absence, a knot in the breast purring Touch, and I will come true. I was "returned," I watched her watch as I babbled It could have been worse. . . . Who can tell what penetrates? Pity is the brutal discipline. Now I understand she can never die, just as nothing can bring me back-- I am the one who comes and goes; I am the footfall that hovers. 1995 |