The Magician's Daughter

The Magician’s Daughter

Some of my first memories in that little house

Were of Daddy juggling with me in the breezeway,

Two red balls turned into three, into dreams of a life on the stage.

The living room spoke an enchanted language of diamonds and spades

Of Queens and Kings

Of silver rings that mystically linked and a black and white wand.

Here he lived life that was hours of work for an hour of fame.

The blood, sweat and tears were all worth it

For my hero card shark.

Every summer we adventured three hours from home

Past the grassy fairy tale bogs

To a familiar campground.

I’d join him up on the wooden stage

The princess of the kingdom.

After the show I was met by demanding voices

 “Tell us the secret!”

“No”, I said. A good magician never tells.

I had the key to the coveted secret,

I had the key to something more.

Bright lights blazed in my eyes

As he floated me to Oriental music

Or we tossed six flashing clubs

And I drank the applause of the dark apparitions;

The stage was my home.

On those long car trips home through summery Maine

I leaned my cheek on the sheer glass

Following powdered sugar stars on walls of navy ice,

Or if my brother was there

We’d giggle in our late night childish joy,

We were made up characters from a different world

In more than one way.

Sometimes Dad would leave for two weeks

Away

To Italy

To Japan

Knowing his return meant hugs and foreign treasures

I stayed up late those nights

Awaiting the sound of a car pulling in

The engine stopping

The key turning

The door opening

Ambushing him with hugs, our unraveled traveler

Jet-lagged, but smiling,

Finally home.

He went to Germany,

So long ago, a flash

A memory because

 Daddy brought me my teddy bear

Cuddly, a token of the days that breathed me into

Spoke me into who I am today.

Different always

Always breathing

The envious breath when confined to the audience,

Red velvet chairs make me squirm

When spotlights flash and beckon me forward,

To venture further and find the fierce adrenaline-joy

That he taught me to love.

Daddy’s blue eyes in me as I live and write and breathe I am

A magician’s daughter.