
Premature
My daughter was born too soon, too small, a valve in her heart flopped like a broken wing and sometimes her heart forgot to beat. I watched her on her warming bed, tubes everywhere, monitors glued to her fishbone chest, her breath quick, as if she'd run to me from far away. I curled her fingers around my one, studied her small face: a brand new country. I brought her home on a monitor, a metal shoe box with blinking lights, learned to press the wire leads beneath her tiny nipple, to love the blinking green of her heart beat. Once, the alarm's squeal propelled me to her crib: a loose lead and her wailing from the noise. For weeks I lived inside that sound. This year, she spits contempt and slams her bedroom door. I want to take her in my hands, undo her, break her into parts and reassemble them. I can't offer her my breast, as I would a baby, but part of me, my hand held out to the dark red shadows of her heart I cannot see. Did I forget? Forget to tell her when they lifted her from me she was a starfish, arms and legs splayed out, how frightened I was of her small heart.