Love set you going like a fat gold watch.The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.In a drafty museum, your nakednessShadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I’m no more your motherThan the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slowEffacement at the wind’s hand.

All night your moth-breathFlickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floralIn my Victorian nightgown.Your mouth opens clean as a cat’s. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you tryYour handful of notes;The clear vowels rise like balloons.