I wonder about my great-grandmother, the fisherman’s bride

if daily she watched the sea, imagining the arrival

of an envoy from the depth:

a small, familiar boat, emerging through the surface

untouched by time.

over there my sister sleeps, invisible,

though I was taught the contours of her face

before learning how to read, and stood for hours

before the mirror, trying to outwit

her relentless duplication: the same soft lashes,

small cheekbones, a face not just my own.

All this to say – I understand why, mama,

you sometimes peer into me, stock still,

as if inspecting water

for tricks of the light