Waking with Russell - by
Whatever the difference is, it all began
the day we woke up face-to-face like lovers
and his four-day-old smile dawned on him again…
babies
Naming - by
___________ –
/
/ your name is the print
/ love has made in the world,
/
/ your body the growing home
/ your spirit has made upon…
Learning to Stand - by
On the earth a stretched second
/ you stood, balanced. Gravity
/
/ glued dolly shoes. You wore
/ the sky on your head, jauntily,
/
/ light blue paper…
Baby Hand - by
Not bones but muscular air
/ inside; why starfish spread
/ five doll small living fingers
/ with cushion button dimples
/ for knuckles. All of…
Gap Year - by
Gap Year
/ (for Mateo)
/
/ I
/ I remember your Moses basket before you were born.
/ I’d stare at the fleecy white sheet for days, weeks,
/ willing…
Trio - by
Coming up Buchanan Street, quickly, on a sharp winter evening
/ a young man and two girls, under the Christmas lights –…
To Andrew, Before One - by
He holds a spoon, certain of what he holds:
/ nothing more solid-certain than his spoon:
/ at clenching fist and hard thing clenched,…
A Mither’s Lilt - by
My bonnie bairn
/ My bonnie bairn
/ My bonnie bairn, there’s blessin’s in yer e’e.
/ An’ O ye hae a dainty mou’, dainty mou’,…
Observances - by
A boy row in a umman’s coatie –
/ In a man’s sark row a lassie:
/ Nor wash…
Dear Hannah… - by
Dear Hannah, Time no less than space
/ would keep us, firmly, in our place.
/ I being old and sluggish, here
/ and you, so…
Love - by
I hadn’t met his kind before.
/ His misericord face – really,
/ like a joke on his father – blurred
/ as if from years…
Flight - by
To wake into this night silence
/ when the wind has dropped
/ and everything is aftermath and dark
/
/ – this is the dream they…