Fleeting

The specter of growth hovers over everything
Dating, Driving, and Moving Vans … I see them everywhere
In the dirty diapers that keep getting bigger and bigger
In the last remaining bottle of our daily routine
In the fast disappearing remnants of the toddler walk
In the growth in her vocabulary and the words that inhabit it
In the kisses she gives to his boo boos
And in his acceptance of those kisses
In their yearning to run out of the room,
To run down or upstairs depending on where we aren’t
And to bolt for the door
I see it in the time I spend away from them,
When I carry them, and hug them,
And when I try to write poetry about them
Failing to capture them even in words
Even now