The Language of Daughters
by Dane Kuttler
When we name our superpowers,
I pick the ability to speak to animals.
My sister chooses invisibility.
In the game, the changes are instant, and immediately useful,
though neither of us understands the other’s selection.
The bafflement will return
when our father dies,
my sister and I learning separate dialects of grief
in the moment we hear the news:
mine, a distress call of wounded lion
against ricochets of thunder,
hers, the soft click-shh of her camera—
her throat, silent for months.