I read a parent who wrote that, in parenting, "I sometimes felt
As if I were taking apart a ship and using the planks to build a ship
For someone else," and I thought again of Shunryu Suzuki's aphorism,
"Life is like boarding a ship about to set sail and sink." I doubted
The writer had Suzuki in mind, but I knew I had taken my own ship
And built a ship for someone else, and now found myself without
Further strategies, either for floating or sinking. Treading water,
I wondered, what have I done? I had wanted to perish just at sunset.
Instead, I gave my life a gloaming. A small child half adrift
In the boat of her own clutched my sleeve. The light wavered.
She could not rescue me. I could not rescue her. Together,
We let the sunset slide down, and there we were, both dreaming,
Still breathing, night rising all around, as night always has,
Full of effectively powerless lights, our imagination's omens,
The reason my daughter named her boat, "Starlight, for wishes!"
Another morning was implied, and another, and another, if not
For me, then for my daughter, my daughter in her floating world.
But I had no strength, no supplies to survive. I had no supplies.
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