Today is Emma’s 22nd birthday. She’s having the best time in our recent cold snap and snow fall. I guess being born in winter and on the Canadian Prairies, predisposes you to like snow and cold – I can’t help but love that about Emma.

I won’t pretend that Emma isn’t a writing muse for me — she inspires me in ways that I can’t explain; we’re connected with a strong tether and I treasure the gift she is to me. So, Happy Birthday Sweetie! And for you, here’s what’s becoming the annual Emma poem:

Her Happy Song

She’s not musical
like grandmother hoped.
Nor politically correct
and certainly not polite!
(she often handed my mom her purse
to show her the door)

But when she’s happy
she shares it like a song –
melodic ripples,
vibrating gutturals, whoops,
glissandos that pull you
up and up, not hindered at all
by speechlessness.

These other tongues,
interpreters of joy, delight,
amusement, play –
translate it all straight
to my heart.

© 2021 Laurel Archer