Sacrosanctity

At bath time I lift a sliver of silver 

letting loose the water that will rinse you 

clean. My fingers test the bubbling current 

pull back, nudge the knob closer to heat. 

I want so badly to protect you, and yet 

you question everything: the temperature 

of water, and the steam rising, as if 

it was a warm front colliding with the side 

of a mountain or wall of cool air— 

something that might turn it violent. 

I tug your sleeve, encourage your slim arm 

to fold in on itself, find its way free, I slide 

shirt over smooth skull, careful not to suffocate 

you, unclothed, vulnerable, test the water, cringe. 

It’s hot, you say, but it’s not, and I wonder 

how a child learns to doubt everything, senses 

the dangerous coexistence of downdrafts and updrafts, 

knows to fear the potential vertical growth 

of the towering cumulous and the eddies whirling 

at the edges of a storm yet unpredicted. 

you bathe quickly, splashing and laughing, for a moment 

forgetting to calculate everything, but I cannot prevent 

the water’s cooling, or the natural patterns of air, 

moisture condensing into water droplets that might slide 

gently down porcelain walls, or form water droplets, hailstones,

a thunderstorm cell. You observe it all and question 

rather than assert, emerge blue-lipped, trembling, 

baptized in worry, burdened with blessing, testing 

the world, and the best I can do is wrap you in warm 

terry cloth, dry your thin skin, anoint you with oil.