Words

The baby is finally asleep, aided by the lullaby CD his godmother bought him, swaddling to keep him from striking his little face, and my presence beside him on the big bed, reading Lavinia by Le Guin. At one point, tired of looking at the colorful book spines on the wall, he turned to me. I showed him my book, the only color of which was ivory with rows of black letters. I read a sentence to him, pointing to each word. He grinned, and the pacifier fell out of his mouth. In his wordlessness, I imagine him to be cleverer than he is -- that he understands these words and is using his vast intellect to put them together. I know it is not true: my conceptions will collapse into his first words, so powerful is our written language. But it is always a mother’s belief that her child is a genius, is it not?