9 ½

My daughter loves improper
fractions.

I look on, alarmed, as she
balances

larger and larger numbers on top:
eleven,

then twenty-five, now ninety
over two.

Figures pile up, hazardous, tilting
the division bar.

“Are you supposed to reduce them?”
I ask.

“No,” she says, “we didn’t learn
simplifying yet.”

She moves on to spelling words–
precarious,

she underlines, impetuous, embarrassed,
giggles–

as her definitions overflow the margins,
swimming

up the right side of the paper, across
the blue lines,

until she sets down her pencil,
satisfied.