Tuesday, 26 October 2010

Baby's Smile

BABY'S SMILE
Lain content across my chest,
my eyes reflected in your blue,
an emptied bottle by our side,
you tell me all I need to know.

A baby does not smile -
those spinster midwives say -
it is merely wind that on expulsion
causes an involuntary upturn of the lips

and only by evoking a response
does the infant come to realise
the possible pleasures of repetition
and his world builds up by recognition.

Yet as we lie here, skin to skin,
you commence the conversation -
having the answer, I do not ask -
is love but the perpetuation of a burp ?
© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Ashton under Lyne, 1st May 1981

Publications

1981 DADDYCATION
(Ashton under Lyne, New Hope International)
1988 Psychopoetica (UK)
1998 Brobdingnagian Times (Ireland)

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