This morning’s first waking,
the light easing through
whatever opening it finds
and the owl’s low question pulling
me from sleep. I don’t remember
my dreams anymore, not as I did,
enthralled by my own night
wisdom spiraling
from sleep’s deep spring. Now I wake
with worry, knowing what I know
is never enough. My mother
still knows me most of the time
and mostly that is enough—that she
knows me as I knew her
before words, as touch and safe
and the giver of food that I ease
between lips that open and close,
open and close. The strawberry moon
slips behind a cloud,
spilling its light as it goes.