Legacy

By Holly Day

Many of Genghis Kahn’s children wanted nothing to do with their father’s lifestyle
found contentment in breeding camels, painting landscapes on pieces of stretched silk cultivating gardens of bright-colored tulips, teaching children to ride horses.
You can’t pick who your parents are. Just because your father
is a conqueror of nations, a leader of hordes of ravaging warriors

it doesn’t mean you can’t spend your own time
teaching the children in the neighborhood
how to build and fly kites, or your dog how to catch and retrieve a ball
or spend most evenings enjoying the way the sunset
fills the hollows of the desert each night

doesn’t mean you can’t just settle with just one woman
have a handful of fierce children with uncomplicated names
leave a legacy of tyranny so far behind you
that only DNA testing will reveal your true name.

Holly Day’s poetry has recently appeared in Analog SF, Cardinal Sins, and New Plains Review, and her published books include Music Theory for Dummies and Music Composition for Dummies. She currently teaches classes at The Loft Literary Center in Minnesota, Hugo House in Washington, and The Muse Writers Center in Virginia.