Poem For The Absent Friend

As part of the reading for The Baby Chronicles, I wanted to do something for James Conant, the unsung man of the hour who provided illustrations for the book. He's still recovering at home after double knee surgery. In his absence, I read the poem below.


Your Children
For James

Bless them with Sunday Wafers
black as the ink that spawned them.
For the baptism, find a receded tide
with plenty of plant for shackling.
If after three days you still dream
Of them, they’re yours
to recreate until someone besides you
is satisfied. Reclaim the bodies,
plaster the protesting corpses.
Hang them in letterboxes
like cribs too close to the window.
Exist them out of existence,
dead enough to stand alone.
Be like any parent with child,
Proud and afraid.