By Arlyn Miller

When you were singing it
in your dorm room
wrapped in the Marimekko quilt
that covers your daughter now
on nights when she can't fall asleep,

you thought you knew
all too well what it meant --
the compromised self
settling for what it could get
or hiding what it wanted.

You didn't know then
about nights like these,
when starving for sleep
you'd stay up to write a poem
on a fairy's behalf
for your first girl's
first fallen tooth,

then wake 3:00 a.m.
to trade a gold coin
for this retrieved bit
of your girl,
the pearly seed
of the love
from which she's sprouting.

One down, twenty-seven to go,
times three children.

The things we do for love.

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