For Mantis, on her 24th Birthday

    Little sister, you went before me into marriage and motherhood with grace and wisdom that overflows to those around you. I so admire your love for Jesus and your earnest compassion for people who lack justice. You are a mother, a wife, and friend, a lover of cats, and are blessed with a smile that has no rival. I love you. Here is a poem about the blessing of our sisterhood, just for you.

For Mantis, on her 24th Birthday

I remember stuffed animals

coming alive in our hands,

dress-up games of make-believe,

distant lands filling our heads

as we climbed mountains

over couches and crossed oceans

over tiny blue rugs, and late at night

we'd dream aloud, our voices

softly traveling between twin beds.

I remember, too, the nightmares,

tears on our pillows or fights in

the daytime. We were discovering

who we were, we were finding

footholds in our faith. Sorrow crept

in among the dreaming, nightmares

routine enough to make us dread

the night, so we kept 

the hallway lit and stayed 

beneath the covers.

There was a day when the

make-believe stopped working. 

My head spun with sadness 

for my dull imagination. Yet you

moved the stuffed animals along

the hardwood floor, seeing a forest,

hearing birds, and I still laughed

at the conversations you spun

for our furry inanimate friends.

We've both now grown past make-believe.

Your imagination shimmers on paper

and brightens your eyes. We inhabit

our dreams, grow fiercer in the face

of nighttime, and although who we were

is not who we are now, somehow we are

more ourselves than ever.