By Becca J. R. Lachman

but in this moment, from your ginger head dipped
            toward the song of the faucet to your pinked
glossy landscape showing off its recent growth rings,
            what could I be but yours? “To bring up”—

that’s what fostering can mean. And it’s like this: a poem
            I knew by heart once, framed or carried in the wallets of priests and
au pairs and waitresses dared “let the soft animal of your body /
            love what it loves.” It was written as a simple exercise, not as any
lifeline—meant to show a friend how a breath can choose

to break open or rest at the end of a line. Just think
            what that means for any of us: our beginning can
be what we need to keep swimming,   or
            our bodies themselves can turn
                                             into dry land.

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Becca J. R. Lachman earned her MFA from Bennington College. Her poetry collections include What I Say to this House, The Apple Speaks, and Other Acreage, and she edited A Ritual to Read Together: Poems in Conversation with William Stafford. Her work has been recognized by the Ohio Arts Council, Black Mountain College Museum & Arts Center, and has been published in Hunger Mountain, Rattle, and Change Seven Magazine. becca-jr-lachman.com