After the training wheels come off
she wobbles and crashes and jumps up
to cry again. She pushes her helmet back
into place and rubs her hands of the gravel.
I force myself not to offer advice. Some
things must come from the center.
Vivian picks up the bike and straightens
the wheels, finds her place on the seat.
The pedals are not too far for her to reach.
She is ripe for this skill, and mostly willing.
She jerks on the handlebars, over rights
herself and falls again. There is such a thing
as too much right. She once told me
that if you do not learn to cartwheel
before you are eight, then you never will.
Something in the vestibular system, I wonder.
I don’t know if it’s true, but I do know
there are certain windows that close.
An eye that is unused in the first few months
of life will never learn to see, though
its parts are all in working order. Perhaps
there are windows for the heart, too,
so that if by a certain age it does not learn how
to get up and try again after it has fallen,
it will stay down and never learn how
to love beyond itself. Come on, I say under
my breath, you can do it, I say to my daughter.
And then out loud I say, Yes, yes, dear girl,
you are doing it. You are doing it, I say
as she falls, falls again, and gets back up.