(for Sarah)

It is hard to be the first,
the one who opens the door
between generations, who
swings between the mother
and the father, the one who
must learn to sleep through
the night, alone.

                          The oldest one,
the eldest, the one who
has her first birthday first
and her second birthday
first, and first rides a bike,
and first goes off to school
and has her picture taken
a hundred times a day.

The first one makes mistakes
that show the others what
to avoid. She must go down
into the dark underworld
of parental ignorance and come
up with a key that will
release her and her sisters
from the fortress where
the ogres planned to keep them
all their lives.

                      She has to be
the first to tell them no, make
them let go. She has to tell them
she isn’t going to be a virtuoso,
doesn’t want straight A’s, won’t
take accelerated math, has to
find her own way. First to say
love me for who I am.

First to want the car keys, first
to hit a tree, first to stay out
late, first not to come home
at all. She makes them pace
the floor, believing in the aliens
that take the real child and leave
heavy metal in her place.

                                       But she’s
the first to come back home,
first to remember your birthday
and Mother’s Day, a bit
extravagant, as first-borns
tend to be. She begins
to admire the way you arrange
your furniture, pages through
your books, notices the
colors in your kitchen—
and then one day she invites you
to dinner, and clearly
she has spent the whole day
making sure everything
is absolutely 
perfect.