41
Sister
Amanda Yskamp
Sometimes it’s the sister
come home from college
with a way to enter
the world anew,
a side door, a compound eye,
an antigravity pill
you take upon your tongue
with Hendrix stitching
the curtains back, and the golden
throats of jonquils swallowing
your fear. She’s traveled far
to tell you. She’s come home
changed. She carries tales
of human folly and complexity,
knows how to settle disputes
with a word. She sings now
in Portuguese, swears in Gaelic,
and when you ask her
what it means, she says,
“you’ll hear my name
in the old door’s hoarse
opening, in the clatter
of your horse’s hooves,
in the river’s unhurried
passage from the mountain
on down to the sea.”