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I thought, when I was twenty, that when I turned 
fifty, I'd be immune to love's vicissitudes, 
and here I am at fifty, indoors, peeling the skin
of a beet, my fingers bloody seeming, and I'm
watching you outside with our grown daughter,
her back's to me, she could be me, something 
about how she leans forward from her shoulders. 
All those years ago, what was it we argued about
so fiercely I crossed the Michigan Avenue bridge,
the Wrigley Building white and tranquil behind us,
but we couldn't let it go, couldn't walk away, we 
hollered across the traffic. Even now I can feel 
my spine lengthen, my shoulders square back, 
a little ferocity hardening me. I finish the beets 
and lean toward the screen, as if to hear what you 
and she say to one another, how you work it out.

Athena Kildegaard