FOR ANNA AT 30

In high school, when you were trying on

Every art, you wrote a poem about me

And LSD, read it, Father-Daughter Nite,

And wowed them at the Tralfalmadore Cafe.

Now, your muse resting, I write your

Mon trentiesme age poem for you,

Your head near bursting with the nouns

And verbs of six languages, my head

Scrimping by on mother tongue, four

Short poems a year, this one for you

And Isaac, your first-born, whose first

Word was "bird," your regular ornithologist,

A poet too maybe (who knows?) growing up

Just in time for the Real Romantic Revival—

Skylark, Nightingale, Golden Bird again.

Mother of poet, mother of birdsong,

Sing to Isaac this Testament after Villon,

About youth, about goodbye, so long, to youth,

Sing the poet's only true and glorious song.