Charlie

A poem for my youngest nephew

A few months ago I met my six-month-old nephew, Charlie, for the first time. He seemed to find me, a bizarre new human suddenly present in his sphere, endlessly fascinating. He stared at me continually, and I won’t pretend I didn’t enjoy it. The poem below is an attempt to capture the feeling of observing and being observed by this new tiny human who I immediately loved with my whole heart.

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Charlie

With eyes a sky-serious
and heavenly blue, he stares
and stares, from the hearth
of mom, he considers
the existence of this
suddenly-present aunt
-shaped being and I share
in the communal 
mesmerization, the swooping 
soul shift—density, texture, 
something like straw into
gold, a simple and wakeful
kiss, a beanstalk exploding 
from the common, ordinary
ground when he, kicking and
grinning in goofy beatitude,
stuffs both small fists with
delight into his mouth.

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