You are mother. You are a girl and fouryears old the day you learn to swim.Your father, a carpenter and a fisherof men, like God's holy son, laysyou on a board and sets you on the waves.You are baptized in wonder. You believethe wood to be the plank of Noah's Ark.You grow to believe a small thing can alterdestiny. The plank is removed. You area legend, the little girl conquering the ocean.The tides of your girlhood shape the shoresof your knowing. Your daughters question whyyou exhaust yourself with worry, ceding toconcern. Sea salt polished your toddler face.You bite your nails. Your daughters catcha whiff of salt seething from your tonsils. You,puzzled by the wilds before you, you do notrealize that you are already doing the unimaginable,raising one girl after another. The eldest is a sirenbearing your name. Your daughters beach whalesand conjure clouds. Your daughters are the workyou are forced to do and your desires for sonsswell. You abandon your daughters in expan-sive anxieties. You're obsessed with sons, treadthe tears of King Henry's wanton wives. Yousee fate as a buoy, cradling flesh. Your bodyis an unwavering presence before your husband.Your daughters resent lighthouses, welcometempests. Your daughters long to know you, sandstinging in their eyes. You want to reinvent yourself,chasing raindrops with your tongue, trying to be enoughfor someone's grown son, baiting the heavens for a boy.