Red Stuff

Down by the river, my little son

Is snapping twigs and tossing them

To see the runoff carry them away

I watch until my mind goes wandering.

“What’s that red stuff?” I hear him say

I look down, absently to see

His white star-fingers staining red

With a thing he has no word for.

The pain has not yet arrived

He is not afraid to touch and taste it

But I see the moment when it does

And I watch it change his face.

When tears are dried and wound is bound

I teach him the word for it

But the meaning of the word

Is the meaning of the world

And I won’t teach him that today.