Before she sleeps, my daughter and I
face each other on her pillow,
our heads heavy, our eyes half mast,
and in the dim light we recite
“The Owl and the Pussycat”—
the words seem to leap between
our breaths so that we can’t tell
where each other’s voice ends or starts,
and I think of the pericardium
around the heart, which the Chinese say
is a boundary place that decides
who gets in and who stays out,
and I marvel at how, for now,
on this quiet night, our hearts
seem to need not any space apart,
and after the owl and the pussycat
dance to the light of the moon, the moon,
we curl into each other’s curves
like two parentheses
on the same side of a thought,
like twin silver runsible spoons.