Hare

I kept you in bed with me so many nights,

certain I could hold the life into you,

certain that the life in you wanted to leap out, hare-like,

go bobbing off into some night-field.

For want of more eyes, more arms

I strapped you to me while I did the dishes, cooked, typed,

your little legs frogging

against the deflating dune of your first home.

Nested you in a car seat while I showered, dressed,

and when you breastfed for hours and hours

I learned how to manoeuvre the cup and book around you.

Time and friends and attitudes, too.

We moved breakables a height, no glass tables.

Fitted locks to the kitchen cupboards, door jammers,

argued about screws and pills someone left within reach.

I’ll not tell you how my breath left me, how my heart stopped

at your stillness in the cot, and who I became

when at last you moved. There is no telling

what skins of me have dropped and shed in the fears

I’ve entered. The day beyond

these blankets, beyond our door

is known to me now, fragile as moth-scurf,

its long ears twitching, alert,

white tail winking across the night-field.