Bristles

There it is—the curve of the brush.
It bristles and tickles the roof of your mouth,
your cheeks ballooning wide, exposing that small, brave gap
you gave away, unique as tide pools,
to your brother and three sisters,
pondering the small spaces
they fill
where you cannot yet reach.

From the crook of my arm, I first read you Kissing the Birds,
where stories soften bone.
My voice dropping like the sun behind Irish hills;
the ocean sways her hips until waves tap shore.
Evening folds you in. She calls: 

Come home.
Come brush.
Brush your hair,
your teeth;
brush the salt from your bones.
Lay the bristles down.
Pull your nightgown close.
Dim the lights—
let the dark tide
in.

My eyes trace your naked feet,
the ones that ran all day through palettes of green,
marked by grass-stroked knees
from climbing walls and counting sheep.

Keep counting.
One.
Two.
Three.

Count the sheep beyond the stone fence.
Count the waves folding into themselves.
Count the stars pricking open
over fields stitched with hedgerow and hush.

Four—for the wind that combs the long grass.
Five—for the gulls settling, white as folded linen.
Six—for the small ache of growing.

Your body, slowly learning
how to belong.

Seven—for the hearth flickering low.
Eight—for the seabird’s thin, silver cry.
Nine—for the hush of this dark holding.

And ten—
for the quiet between us,

your bones remembering
the rhythm of being carried.

Sleep now, little runner of green fields.
Sleep, gap-toothed dreamer.
The hills will keep watch.
The ocean will keep swaying.

And I will keep counting,
long after you have gone.