I Dream of our Hypothetical Daughter

Curried with birth
and soft eyes, a face
you’d instantly fall for.

My love for her thrums
through me, a basin of water
receiving the rain. Or two pots

of thyme in the back garden,
each volunteering its smell
as a language.

We try an experiment:
unstrap her head
from her body and attach it

to a fox’s body. We walk her
around like that—small, fast
and red—for an hour, then

grow panicked we caused
her first pain. So we unclip
the fox legs and marshmallow her

back into the burl
of a newborn. I hitch
her to my hip and turn on

the faucet. Try to gather
some liquid into the crook
of my palms. The baby sloshed

softly over my hipbone,
my sense of balance
redesigned.

I can’t tell
what I want.

How should one
love the world?

And the permanence eats
at my mind. Even dreaming,
it eats me. I wake

with a shimmer.
I see why
people are especially high

on their babies.
Before even a word
has stirred their dreams

into something
with teeth or
with hooks.

Lover,
will we be enough
for each other?

And other questions
queer people
are not supposed to ask.

The quiet of babies,
even the quiet
of their yelling.

Their minds underwater
where only love
reaches.