The river’s edge teems with leafy
groundcover, tiny forest
that steals the sound from our steps.
In its lushness, you stumble silently
in search of stems that glow. Soon
you turn toward me again, petals
starring your chin, stems in your hand
reduced to their centers—and really,
I can understand why you’d want
to consume their color, to get close
to that wild beauty, to know it
in a whole-bodied way. Later
when you lie on the grass, twigs
catching in your curls, I do the same:
watching you watch the branches
etch a web against the pale sky. At least,
this is what I think you see, but perhaps
it’s pinecones, or the wind, or something
unknowable in your growing mind.
In my own mind I wonder how we
got here, how once my body carried
yours, but now your wonder
enfolds us both, opens me up each
morning like a field feasting on light.
Emily Patterson is the author of So Much Tending Remains (Kelsay Books, 2022). She received her B.A. in English from Ohio Wesleyan University, where she was awarded the Marie Drennan Prize for Poetry, and her M.A. in Education from The Ohio State University. Emily’s work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and appears in Rust and Moth, Minerva Rising Press, Sheila-Na-Gig, The Sunlight Press, Mom Egg Review, Literary Mama, and elsewhere.
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Emily - I love this!!! My son is grown with kids of his own now but this took me right back to those first years and what a privilege it was/is to be his mom.