THE STEP-FATHER SYNDROME

Solomon issued his verdict: "Bring me a sword. Divide the living child in two, and give half to one, and half to the other" . The two mothers' reactions were worlds apart. The first mother pleaded with the king: "O my lord, give her the living child, and by no means kill him!" But the second mother's words were chilling: "Let him be neither mine nor yours, but divide him".(1 Kings 3:24-26)

Wandering through the lobby of the dance studio like mewling sheep,

children bump numbly into each other, into walls and tables.

Women with wardrobes out of Good Housekeeping

collect their progenies by chant; “Come here David.

Don't touch her David. David. David.”

Each parent sees with an old priest's eyes,

casually glancing over the herd like Solomon

when he ruled over two mothers and one baby.

Back then, a man arguing with a woman

over flesh and blood, a Daddy, might, too,

have agreed to have his half split, wrapped,

and handed to him like a tenderloin,

while every mother screamed no forever.

But in the dance studio, I neither deny nor claim,

and the two little girls dressed in tutus and tights

I brought to their ballet lessons aren't mine.

I have no spare doorway in which I could pine for these girls,

but after carrying them back and forth from dance to school,

reminding them to put their carefully folded underwear

back into their dressers instead of strewn on the couch,

listening daily to stories of who said what when ,

my love plays the old wet nurse, applied dutifully.

But when my wet nurse of love returns home

to the town where I will die, no children will follow

bawling and left behind.

I, too, know that need to have

two little girls cut in half to see

what's mine and not mine. Yet,

if their Daddy came forward to claim his own

in front of Solomon the King we both

would be left with our ears ringing

in the church bells of their screams"

So now, I watch the mothers’ mouths

closely, practicing how to wrap my lips around

the long “O” sound, and say, “No, these girls are not mine.”