After Winter Solstice
From the book Alive In These Woods
Because you are pregnant
the days grow rounder with light,
the long oaks bend towards each other
as through a glass orb—
loose blouses like snow drifts.
I wish I had sung to you more
when you were inside me,
carried you less like the marriage
I knew was failing. I wish I could’ve kept
my mind in the same place as my body.
This year the winter will not drag on.
I will measure the slowly accruing
light in your changing form.
Who knows what settles
as I watch you slice the peaches.
Maybe a future entomologist’s fingers
are finding their first
meticulous rhythm. Maybe the delicate
register of your child’s voice
is gathering its notes.