They say if you don't
name a child when it is born,
it will start crawling north,
unable to be pulled back
by the string of its name.
It will start the party
without you, without names.
Once on a busy downtown street,
I saw a woman lower
a blue rope around her
two children saying:
"This is for safety.
Because I love you" –
and she pulled the knot closed.
A perfect lasso of love.
and so her children went
in blue orbit around her,
and so wherever they wandered
she could pull them back
by the string of their names.
Or perhaps they had
no names. And so
she bound them tight
with ropes, afraid they
would go spinning away from her,
without names,
without ropes,
away.
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