Beautiful Boy

You are numbers, logic, and detail. Your eyes are deep, and sometimes when I look into them, I see a galaxy of ideas swirling at light speed. No star in there has lost its light.

I look through your eyes, into your brain, which then whooshes into your heart and soul to a place that is the deepest deep. A deep that is often only expressed through waters that have risen so high, they gush from your depths into the corners of your eyes where they spill out down your white rose cheeks.

You study the world forward, backward, and all-around—viewing it from every corner before setting out to make it all right.

You lived in silence as you absorbed, completely, the world around you. You know every birthday, direction, and nanosecond as time seems to bend to fit your rhythm.

You are Brahms’ waltz—perfectly timed at 96 beats per minute. You invite us to dance and help me notice nuances I hadn’t yet heard.

You took my hand and led me to the sanctuary of motherhood—a place found in pebbles on the beach, hiding places under a tree’s canopy, and one more story before bed.

At four, X became 24, and M became 13. You had no voice, but there were doll and ball written in yellow sidewalk chalk. As such, you dismantled the glass castle of my construction called parenting and then rebuilt a grand skyscraper in its place, full of rooms filled to the brim with beautiful surprises.

You love the world. Truly. We trace the globe with our fingers, traveling from China to Paris in seconds. You gobble up what the world has to offer and dream of distant places as you wonder aloud if the Great Wall of China is really that big and what it is to stand on the top of the world’s highest mountain peak.

I’ll never get over exploring the galaxies as you see them, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful boy.