Numbers
/The weight of your box of mementos: 10.5 pounds
Three times the weight of you
The photos of me holding you: 4
Blurry in that dim delivery room
My father in the background
Our faces stricken
The number of sympathy cards on the occasion of your birth: 99
The people who touched you: less than 10
Visitor restrictions lifted
They gathered around the bed
I think my mother said a prayer
The pages of your birth story: 6
The people who saw you—really saw you: 4
A midwife, two nurses, and my sister
Behind the curtain, taking pictures with her cellphone.
The weeks you have been gone: 139
The times I have looked at your photograph: 7
Trying to see my little boy behind the vernix and the purple
Trying to feel your weight
Trying to imagine you
It’s all I get to do, imagine you.
What do you have of your baby(ies)? What are your numbers right now?