The Sister of Icarus

Because I dream of flying, I ask my father for wings. He believes only sons should fly above the earth. At first, I turn angry at this lack of value awarded to daughters. Don’t I deserve the same rights as my three brothers?

When offered wings, my smartest brother refuses them.

He says, “Had we been meant to fly, we’d have been born with wings.”

The second brother fears heights, never hiking up mountains when the rest of us travel.

“I’ll man the base camp,” he always says, making sure the fire stays lit and that wild animals don’t steal all the food. He is so terrified of heights that when our father offers him the fabricated wings, of course he turns them down.

The youngest brother, all impulse and recklessness, grabs the wings from our father’s gifting hands. When that brother ends up falling into the vast ocean, my father orders me to save my sibling.

I smugly say, “But, Father, you never taught me to swim. Only the boys were given that lesson.”

And I watch my brother drown.

Maureen Sherbondy's most recent book is Lines in Opposition. Her work has appeared in Harpur Palate, The Oakland Review, Calyx, and other journals. She lives in Durham, NC. The Body Remembers will be published in 2025.