with child's eyes

she carries the stamp of the divine.
it's on her fingerprints.
it runs off on everything she touches-
like ink.
no one has told her yet
that she is no artist
and so an artist she is.
she builds treehouses 
out of scrap paper poetry,
scatters seeds,
waits for the birds to come-
meadow lark,
swallow,
chickadee.
blackbird with bohemian dreams.
she has yet to learn
which are supposed to belong 
and so she has space for them all.
paper and lace
suitcase
fireplace
she sits at the window
lost in library pages.
no one has told her yet
that her best friends cannot be literary
and so these pages are the nest 
from which she will learn to fly.
but she has time.
and those days she paints letters
on the branches of trees-
they will teach her
who she is meant to be.

grow to the sky-
defy
gravity.
shelter me
in your library. 

soft-cover suitcases

I will give my daughter a home 
in these forests of ink, towering
towards a folded paper sky.
I will give her the opening pages-
her mama's heart, her daddy's pleasure
write her name in the empty spaces
until she learns to stand.

I will give her my soft-cover suitcases
mostly filled with hopes and dreams
(whatever that means)
and some paper thin memories.

I will read them to her on quiet days
so she can hear
what's whispered in the turn of the winds
i will give her a strand of desert beads
(parched paper and leaves)
to bind her hand to mine 
until she's ready to break free
and write

the deep-blue
deep inside 
electrifying, fear-denying
story we hope she'll one day lead
(her daddy and me)

but these are just words.