• And so he sat there
    on the old stone bench
    of his forefathers.
    He glanced back at her
    with a gesture of uncertainty,
    as if everything in the world changed its meaning.
    Perhaps it was because he thought of her as something else,
    her name, her form,
    rather than who she really is.
    It is not unusual, when distracted, to get two things confused.

    With or without wine;
    this is how things come to be.

    He shifted toward the kiln
    muttering a litany of vulgarities,
    and meanwhile - hoping that he was the sole listener of such words -
    he scanned the floor
    observing the tiny fragments of baked clay and dust in their union.
    He shut his mouth
    and watched the worker ants carry pebbles
    of clay and bread crumbs
    twice thier size
    to a small mound somewhere outside.

    She called out to him for breakfast.
    Bread, cheese, and coffee
    remained unchanged

    But the mornings and nights
    have changed.
    The house will change.

    From their previous waking hour,
    between the white linens
    wrinkled with playful agitation,
    did she tell him in the secure silence
    of their bedroom
    that her period was two weeks late.
    And for a moment he lay there
    with simultaneous happiness and fright
    creeping up from his gut to his chest.

    In the rarest moment of his life
    he realised that he was a child
    once upon a time.
    A father, and an embryo,
    and a fragment of clay.