At Twelve

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He plays the game with convincing skill
even though he’s only twelve.
Sliding a lost molar under his pillow,
not once breaking character
as a naive kid who still believes
in the tooth fairy.
Some things are just baked in
to who he was always going to be;
puréed lamb, his first meat
a twig on the ground, his first weapon
farts and penises, the funniest-best things.
He says he loves to stay up all night
talking to his friends online,
red-rimmed, glass-eyes by 10pm
and cuddles to sleep,
more of the story.
He tells me it’s time to cut his hair
which I scoop up to lay
in sweaty tangles on his pillow at night,
blonde taffy, swinging past his waist by day,
just like mine at his age.
He’s been growing it for years but,
“I’m tired of people thinking I’m a girl.”
He gives me unsolicited advice
about love and dating, about parenting his younger brother
and although I smile at his sweetness,
veil my exasperation at his intrusiveness,
he often sees with a startling, crystalline truth
unobstructed by life experience.
He cries sometimes, hiding in his bed
like any wounded wild creature would.
I wedge myself between him and the wall, offer a shoulder.
I remember the weight of twelve
when everyone sees a carefree kid, a dumb silly kid, a sweet kid
and being aware
for the first time
that I was barely a kid anymore.
He asks me how we know
when we’re going to die and, "Why do we have to die?"
He is small but he is not empty.
At twelve, he sees that life is an unmanageable beast at times
he sees that his whole life so far
is shifting into the unknown, this
edge of the world, he feels it, and it overwhelms.
So he slides a tooth under his pillow,
does a goofy dance on the way to the bathroom, buys virtual weapons in virtual life, tries to eat candy for breakfast in front of me, with raised brows, asks me to rinse the shampoo out of his hair in the bath, and always tells me he loves me,
“more.”