she will hang your posters all around her room.
(like i hung our pictures.)

she will listen to your songs, louder than her father would like.
(i will listen only when my husband doesn't know.)

she will beg and beg to go to your concerts.
(and i will oblige, secretly thrilled to have a proper reason to go.)

she will oooh and ahhh over how you look even better in person.
(but i know that you look best in setting summer sun.)

she will yearn for an autograph.
(i will get backstage passes.)

she will be thrilled to meet the man of her dreams.
(i will be thrilled to spend a stolen moment with you.)

you will be a famous musician.
i will be raising a family.

when i am home, alone, the kids off to school, the day ahead of me stretching out -
clean up from breakfast, start laundry, have lunch, start preparing dinner, get kids from school,
take kids to sports, cheer no matter how bad they are, bring them home, finish dinner,
greet husband, have dinner, clean up from dinner, play with kids, put kids to bed,
spend time with my husband - perhaps i will turn on the radio, perhaps i will hear one of your songs,
and perhaps it will take me back.

back to fourteen and believing we could conqure the world. back to sitting in my yard
with your arm around my shoulders for so long that we killed the grass under that big tree.
back to our first kiss: sunset, 12th ave, back when you wanted a hug goodnight every night.
back to the life we were going to live -- twins (it runs in your family), a gorgeous house that
was in no way near any sort of suburb at all, the kids learning to love music
(they would have worn earmuffs when they were little, but they would have been to every show).

who knows where you will be, who knows who you will be with.
maybe the songs won't even be about me.

the only thing that will matter is that once, once upon a time,
you promised me they would be.

(while my daughter scans every magazine for any scrap of information on you,
i will remember the deserted auction house, one fall night --
and who that song is really about.)