Table of Contents
Acknowledgments xi
I Clara (1895-1967)
Luke Says It's Another Silly Idea 3
Playing My Cards 5
Fight at the Dance 7
Saying I Do 8
I Study Luke 9
Wanting to Dance 11
Losing the Ring in the River 12
Cause, Effect. Cause, Effect. 13
I Can't Forget 14
This House Isn't Mine 15
Why I Don't Crush the Spider 16
When I Have Hurt Him as Much as I Can 18
I Was New and Shiny 19
My Firstborn, My Eddie, Asks What I Remember 20
My Daughter, Leaving 21
Potato Soup 23
The First Cicadas 25
Today a Dust Devil 26
Deciding to Write 27
I Tell Myself a Story 28
II Emma (1925-1996)
Retina 33
Source 35
Marriage: Jump Rope 36
One Summer Only 37
I Could Have Named It Love 38
Eventually 39
The Meal You Bought Me 40
Labor 41
That Moment When 42
Cut and Cut 44
Final Hearing 46
Nights Aren't the Worst 47
Coping 48
Length of the River 49
Mercury in Retrograde 50
California Moves Farther Away 51
Love, I'm Done 52
I Wade In 53
Raising Liz 54
Before This 55
Therapy 56
Let Me Write About Her 57
When I Lie on My Back and Cross My Ankles 58
What Do I Want? 60
Haircut 61
To My Daughter 62
III Liz (1946-)
Dancing in My Mother's House 67
Let Me Be the First Snake of Spring 68
To the Moon in the Morning 69
I Have Nothing to Say About Fire 70
Believing Fiction 71
Unadorned Fingers, Familiar Palm 72
Remembering Where I Came From 73
I Had Never Seen Anyone Dead 74
Skinny-dipping with the Neighbor Boys 76
Another Thing I Did Not Tell My Mother 78
Like Everybody 80
Mother and Father Arrive Together in a Dream 82
My Mother's Bath 83
Note to My Father After All These Years 85
I Leaned in Close 86
Mother, I Wanted 87
What Belongs to Us Returns Often 88
New Love 89
You and I, the Cranes, the River 90
Your Hand Is Injured 91
Take, Eat; This Is My Body 92
