Left on a mountainside

you

with your strange

scarred feet, but in all

other ways

a perfect little king.

I daubed your feet

bound them in silk.

I was your legs,

carried you wherever

you wanted to go…

but then you wanted to go.

The marks were there for a reason

but I wouldn’t listen to reason

I only wanted you

you

who became king

to strangers

I remember you onstage

in your crown of leaves

missing a tooth, hair chopped

in a playdate gone wrong

but your face

beaming, vivified.

That’s our son

we said, that’s our boy.

Now your father is dying

and creeps about with a cane

he wants to see you

to call you his heir

When you were a baby

you had fever in the night

I lifted you from the crib 

and held you hot against me

wiped the vomit from your mouth

and smoothed your hair, 

caked wet with sweat