I went with my mother and her mother
To hear Joyce Carol Oates speak
I went because my mother asked me
And because her mother is dying

I sat chatting with a grandmother I didn't know
While my mother graded papers on my other side
If a stranger had looked at us
They might have assumed that I was the link between them

Sitting there
The years stretched out in front of me

I knew that I was a woman
In a family of women I do not admire
I knew that I learned to be a woman
From those who didn't know how
But in that moment I felt their inadequacies
Differently
I felt the pain and loneliness shimmering around them
I felt their self hatred and their guilt

My grandmother said she was sorry for giving me bad genes
I said I had done wonderful things with them so not to worry
My mother said nothing because she was working

And so I sat between
A woman who is dying alone after a life of self hate
And a woman who is working herself to death
because of her own perceived inadequacies
I am glad I don't believe in fate.