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Poetry | September/ October 2020

Spinning Daughter

By Nancy McCabe

In a video, you spin before Milan Cathedral:
your dress swings, flares open like an umbrella,
shelters landing pigeons that peck at the ground.
Tourists stream behind you, minute hand sweeps,
clouds scrub the sky, the sun winks out.

For years we spun in circles, you dizzy,
undiagnosed, sleeping your life away. Time halted,
wouldn't budge. I despaired for your future.
Now, far away, you twirl before a cathedral
like that silhouette illusion of a pirouetting dancer
teasing the hemispheres of our brains.
I'm of two minds, the one that misses you
and the one that rejoices in your clockwise whirl,
that knows the misery behind this joy,
the stillness behind this motion.

Abruptly, like that kinetic optical illusion,
you change direction, everything happens in reverse,
as if, now tightly wound, you unwind, counterclockwise,
momentum, once begun, refusing to let up:
birds spit up crumbs, rear up their heads, 
are yanked into the air by tail feathers,
inhaled by a wind that scissors all the legs backward.
Clouds rapidly return to their original position,
the sun appears, disappears, reappears again,
clock hands race to retrace their path,
as if all in your wake, the earth wobbling from the sun,
and back again, whole seasons passing in a blur.

12 replies on “Spinning Daughter”

Eileen Andersonsays:
October 5, 2020 at 2:50 pm

This is terrific. Can I read it on open mic in the Buttonwood Performing Arts Center. I have been reading my essays and other people’s short stories

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
October 6, 2020 at 1:13 am

Of course! Thank you!

Reply
Karen Shoemakersays:
October 5, 2020 at 4:22 pm

This is beautiful Nancy! I love mother daughter poems.

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
October 6, 2020 at 1:13 am

Thanks, Karen!

Reply
Cindy Sanderlin Vincentsays:
October 5, 2020 at 8:54 pm

I love this poem. I love the layers in what at first appears to be a relatively simple image.

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
October 6, 2020 at 1:14 am

Thank you, Cindy!

Reply
Rick Brownsays:
October 8, 2020 at 7:01 am

Beautiful, Nancy!

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
October 8, 2020 at 7:57 pm

Thanks, Rick!

Reply
Donata Thomassays:
October 23, 2020 at 1:32 pm

That was breathtaking! I am reminded of Rome, of beauty and death, of chaos. And of time, going way, way, too fast.

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
October 24, 2020 at 10:35 am

Thank you, Donata! I’m honored that you articulated exactly what I was hoping to get across!

Reply
Ashleysays:
November 14, 2020 at 12:13 am

This is phenomenal! I felt transported to this moment, this memory and enjoyed the peace and tranquility. Thank you for sharing it! My favorite line was “clock hands race to retrace their path, as if all in your wake”. As a new Mom I’m learning just how much it all goes way too fast and it really does seem as though time is only moving for them. Constantly chasing their growth. I love this so much!

Reply
Nancy McCabesays:
January 15, 2021 at 9:04 pm

Thanks, Ashley! I love the way you put it—“constantly chasing their growth.”

Reply

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