PAD Challenge 17

The Writer’s Life


Traces of peanut butter
on the computer keys signals
my daughter has been here.
I imagine her sliding herself in my chair
like a cat looking for the right spot
as she opens to a blank page,
waiting for new words
to enter her thoughts
and take over her fingers.
The imagination blooms
as she turns letters into child’s play.
I watch from the margins,
envy her great body at work
pounding out the most amazing story,
her opus at age 4, about something
that just happened or yet to happen,
like the arc of her life or her first written word.