the pilot’s daughter

we arrived impossible and unbelieving
you unready for ruins, and me
with a secret in my lap, and a prayer
may it float on blood (as it does water)
i tuck the risk behind my cheek

i begged for this chance
to kiss the earth above haboba’s feet
to trace the walls you wouldn’t keep
to know the wind that taught you flight
my hands overflow with evidential shadows

while i return to map your departure
instead i confront my own, ancient
choices flood my coordinates
i dig the banks for buried cardinals
but surface only hollow bones

how many before me
were asked to choose:

root / or seed
marrow / or vessel
father / or mothering?

the burden may be the choosing
but i am the pilot’s daughter. i know
how to build homes between.

_________

A. Mustafa is a Sudanese American educator and writer. Her work is forthcoming in Cosmonauts Avenue, and Sukoon Magazine.