this morning, handsome as a child, touches 
with warming fingers the amethyst mallow.

delivers, gladly, each from darkening time:
the businessman, lucid as professor;

the tyrant, same as refugee, receives
his quickening caress, the goldenlight of youth.

but not each child. nor any child— the sun
has blinded all with his apparition.

a forest of light is teething in the seed,
dog star, a diamond cleverly effaced.

her baby will be different from the rest:
impeccable smile, a garden’s wondering, walking train—

daily untangling from the priest’s embrace;
to carry off, intact, her very name.

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