Dad, you know I already have a job. I wait tables.

[Long pause] You should find a job, Na, in writing.

Uh, Dad, it�s not that easy.

Pause. Ok, ok. You have enough money?

Yes. I�m fine. How are --

[Click]

Afterwards I couldn�t edit poems. I wanted ice cream. I wanted a big bar of chocolate. Flan. Taro root pudding. Something sweet to further rot my whim-rotten teeth, a different sort of ache. Sugarless, I am wistful for the girl I might have been, the girls we might have been, had we not the kind of love our parents give us.

It is a momentary wistfulness. I cannot rue every misdeed, mine or others, even as it is my wont, for these misdeeds have shaped me as much as joy and faith. Take it for what it is and move on, girl, the fetters are as binding as you allow them to be, so take a knife or a pair of scissors and cut yourself free of that past.

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