I hold my friend’s new baby
who sleeps right through
freeze-dancing and piñatas
at his sister’s birthday party
all the five-year-olds
run around like race cars
they do not look twice
at this wisp of a boy
his skin is like an eyelid
I can see everything moving
underneath the gauziness of him
his heart bounces
his veins shuffle blood
back and forth
he smiles in his sleep
his wrinkled fist
punches absent-mindedly
at the sky
the kids stampede past us again
on their way upstairs
for the Easter Egg hunt
I cover his little ears
but he hasn’t paid attention
to any of it
I realize that nothing can compare
to what he has just come through
all the milk and the air
and the bright thrust of life
perhaps we too
would let the elephants
run past us
if God herself
had just walked in
and answered it all.