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No poems, not even

one, since the minute

you were born. Now, I live

the thing that was the writing,

more intensely, alongside you

each day. Hours blur,

and are measured

only in feedings, naps

just quick enough to not subtract

from your later dreaming.

Mom & I divide the night

into shifts, dance through the fog

of sleep deficits doctors say

we won’t feel the weight of

until wintertime. So what.

Our home glows

like a field of rushes,

moonlight ensnared

in their flaxen heads.

Most early mornings

with you are mine.

We play the elevator

game and improvise

lyrics, rhyming August

with raucous, florist, flawless.

As I write this, you rest

in a graphite- gray carrier

on my chest, your thinking adorned

with language that obeys no order

my calcified mind can 

express.Tomorrow, I will

do the thing where I make my voice

sound like a trombone, and I hope

you like it as much as you did

today. There is no sorrow

I can easily recall. I have

consecrated my life.

Dad Poem, XII (The New Temporality)

Joshua Bennett

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