I’ve boasted to your aunt Marion about how quick
you are with numbers. Mama unfolds a letter.
She wants you to come live with them and go to the school
she runs in London. It’s better than the school in town.
I promised to help you! Sarah hugs her youngest sister,
who now can walk but never talks or claps
when Sarah sings nursery rhymes.
What about my brothers? Will they come too?
Girls need better educations than boys, not worse,
for none of us knows what may happen. I wish
I learned more than sewing, which doesn’t pay much.
Mama pulls her close. Sarah hears her heartbeat,
remembers her father listening to what was hidden inside.