Katherine Hoskins
FILIAL
Who raced with Cain, played dolls with Abel,
Romped with John and his applauded
Cousin, Eve's beloved, violable
Child, Christ's half and younger sister,
Who's happily to father wed
Now seeks her childhood's mother.
Behind the dim humane illusion,
She yearns for Mary's tender hands
And kindness tutored by frustration;
She yearns for giant Eve's smooth wheat–
Gold pillow belly undulant
In summer smelling heat.
The avid girl would grow long ears
To hear the mother words that mother's
Long forgot, in deep arrears
Before the baby brain could jell
One liquid sweetness from another,
Yet every echo held.
May ears grow quick and quivering!
For if the patricidal tread
Of Time's young sons, who've freshly ringed
And hacked his proudest trees of thought
And ground their daddy's bones for bread
Should drown out her resort;
