It’s the same boy, I think.
Cheekbones, eyes, hair, the same.
I hold the tiny hand that exerted your will, much bigger now, my favorite crease of your palm flattened by the growth of years.
Your precious foot which fit in the palm of my hand now carries you down the hill at full speed and stomps in the river with abandon.
My baby is here yet my baby is gone. A certain kind of mourning. You no longer fit across my lap. You are too big to climb Mommy Mountain.
You don’t remember any of it. The long nights pacing. How I nursed you every few hours for months. How I loved your baby-seriousness. How we loved exploring. How we loved.
We took long walks with you strapped to me in your carrier. You held my finger in your tiny hands and steered which way I should go. We turned the corners together, tethered as one.
Now you run ahead, so big. My baby inside you, somewhere. Only I remember.
But maybe somewhere inside, you remember too. Like a cloud with an indescribable shape, or the rushing riverwater that is forever blurry. How we loved.
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