You know that thing that happens
when you think you’ve got
the thing down—

you’ve been practicing the thing
ad nauseum bit by bit
here and there for weeks—

and you go to do the thing,
confident that you can do
the thing—because you had it,

you really had it, during all
that practice—and then it
becomes abundantly clear

that you don’t have the thing
down when it really matters,
making you wonder what

all that practice was for,
which sends you right back
to practicing, your jaw now

set in its most determined
posture, because you are
going to get that thing down

if it’s the last thing you do,
which is when that little voice
of… well, who knows who…

nudges you with its ethereal
elbow and says, “Honey, relax.
You’re bound up like a fat ball

of rubber bands. It’ll happen if you
just relax.” And you sigh, letting
your jaw soften into its naturally

jowly state, and you think of
whoever it was in the long ago who
made you laugh when he said,

“We’re having fun, dammit!”
And you remember it was the one
you called Father, sitting out there

in the dark, applauding his girl
up there in the band, playing her
little heart out. She didn’t have

that thing down perfectly either.
She still doesn’t. But she is having
fun, dammit. She really is.