[Published in the July 23 issue of Catapult magazine: http://www.catapultmagazine.com/on-retreat/poetry/evening-retreat]

This side of the world flees from the sun,
And the dark certainty of evening is our quiet comfort.
We three women are aligned like the stars of Orion’s belt.

The elder daughter sits across the room at the keyboard of her instrument.
She conducts a symphony drawn from the depths of cyberspace,
Filling our ownspace with unfamiliar yet haunting melodies.

The younger daughter lies on her belly in the middle of the room,
Her pencil dances across paper as if to the music.
Its partner is the wolf that appears beneath the pirouette of the lead toe.

I am the third, and our silence is like the language of stars.
I watch my daughters as I write, and out of my fingertips fly words;
Unsung lyrics for the music, unspoken stories of dancing wolves.