My Daughter.

I don't hold a child in my arms,
when I hold my child.

I don't soothe a baby,
when my baby needs soothing.

She is not an infant.
She is not a small person.

she is not a kid, a bundle, a niña

She is my daughter.

She is the fleshy combination
of my egg,
and her father's sperm
curdled to life
within my body,
my uterus.

She is factual, she is real.
real in the sense that I must not fail
with such a delicate reality
real in the sense that I am her God.
I am her Earth, her Mother, her Alpha and Omega
breakfast and dinner

She is more than factual, she is beyond reality.
fantasy in the sense that she is above logistics,
she is unpredictable, resistant to plans
fantasy in the sense that her smiles happen when the camera's batterie's dies
that the wrenching effect of her laughter upon my heart
could have never been prepared for.

My baby is not a baby.
My baby is my daughter.