Morning Song Love set you going like a fat gold watch. The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry Took its place among the elements. Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival.New statue. In a drafty museum, your nakedness Shadows our safety.We stand round blankly as walls. I'm no more your mother Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow Effacement at the wind's hand. All night your moth-breath Flickers among the flat pink roses.I wake to listen: A far sea moves in my ear. One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral In my Victorian nightgown. Your mouth opens clean as a cat's.The window square Whitens and swallows its dull stars.And now you try Your handful of notes; The clear vowels rise like balloons. Sylvia Plath, in Ariel, ed.Harper & Row, 1966. --------