My wife, erudite as she is, wrote this yesterday in response to my beholding of our local daughter friend. I just told her, that people need to be seen daily, we yearn to be adored even for an instant, and our ignored parts from earlier in our lives, need to be filled with a loving gaze. The healing power of gazing at one another well, that is in Love, can’t be overrated!

the unobserved daughter
I see you
I see you where you dwell
I see you where you want
I see you where you grieve
I see you where you are unobserved
I see you tuck these inners away
I see you stand and walk with intent
The pace of holding high and competent
(Does she know?
Does she know
her skin, her neck, her belly, her bones, her eyes
are one story?)
Irish, German, African, Mexican
A story in your body, not
your mind, power, capacity
A story in the very thing I made
worth beholding on its own
It exists before me always
You read your story in your children
your work, your overcomings,
the external power,
the politic of you
But I see you as one, as worth the mountain
behind you