For my Daughter on her First Birthday
 
You were late,
but ordinary. Average
height, average weight,
 
without complication.
When they laid you
on my chest,
 
you were a frog queen
come up for air,
slick, wrinkled,
 
your legs splayed
as if ready to leap.
From salt water
 
and cells,
I formed you
as I was formed,
 
as your father was
by his mother,
with limbs beginning
 
as paddles, lungs filling
with fluid. Repetition
should dull wonder,
 
but you emerged
like a continent
breaking off from Pangaea,
 
and I held you close,
knowing the ocean
would have its way.


Published in Southern Humanities Review