My son is setting (Caleb)

My son is setting

My boy leans against my chest

Half-itching the top of his scalp

With a figure-eight formation

Half-resting his weary neck

From holding up his head after 

A long day at summer camp.

He turns his ear toward my heart

Cupping it against my skin

Listening for the drumbeat of life

Nestling in, the heart his home.

A nesting and homing instinct, both.

My fingers rake through tightened curls

Coiled like rattlers poised to strike

Snake-handling, I tame each tuft 

with slow strokes of tender touch

as dusk settles leaving us in June-shadows.

His eyes hang heavy 

Like a closing sign in the window pane

at the end of business hours,

“Closed for business. See you tomorrow!”

They speak of a day well spent, now spent,

The weight of his head growing heavier

As his brain and body reflexively retire.

His body now limp upon my lap

I feel his twitching limbs. Like electrical impulses

They fire through his sleeping frame

As thought to recharge him 

In the marrow for the morrow.

I see a sliver of his back-rolled eye

A waning crescent moon off white

The lunar phase of this boy’s day

And I, the Sandman-father, smile.