The Freckled Penumbra Of A Beautiful Apple Tree Poem by Robert Rorabeck

When you bathe your daughter in that little room,
And when she sleeps beside you in that littlest of beds:
Then these are just the unread words
Scribble in the lavatories of unclimbable mountains,
And you do not think of me;
But you feel me beating beside you, like a tiny toy heart
Wound to beat next to yours; beating through
The Christmases you have never loved, and coming nearer
To you along the northern highways you have never even
Thought to have traveled by;
And though I am not beautiful, you know me now:
For I have become your hero, and I have slept on your
Roof, and traveled around your neighborhood, protecting you
When you aren’t even there, and reciting things to you
That have very little meaning without you as a subject-
Like thorny bushes that cannot ejaculate into flowers-
Like a lonely plane without the sky for a horizon-
Have you discovered then, Alma, that without me, you
Are like a sea without sailors, uncharted,
Unnamed- and you need my senses to cartograph the beating
Of your amber heart- so that I may lay down beside you,
Nuzzling your subtle columns- even perhaps like one of
Your young uncles, a day laborer taking siesta in
The freckled penumbra of a beautiful apple tree.