“Daddy sleep,” you say as you point to the floor by your crib. I wonder what nightmares look like to a two-year-old mind and caress your cheeks until the tears are gone. You’re too tired to notice me screw up the words to your favorite lullaby. Maybe just grateful I’m kneeling by your side.

I’ve been pulled into your room. Dragged from sleep and thrown into consciousness by your irresistible force. I never escape it. I am in orbit. Endlessly falling. I know that some moons have white hot cores. Its planet reaches an invisible hand deep inside of the heart of the moon and squeezes a cold mass into burning life. I know what that feels like.

I kneel at your side, reeling. How could something so exhaust me and still lift me from exhaustion? I’m destroyed, down to the subatomic level and reconstructed into what I must keep becoming. I’m painfully aware that I can never explain this love. It’s a wound that never heals. An ache that never leaves. A burden that is never lifted. It is bliss.

“Daddy sleep.”

“Sure.”

I fall to the floor. Your tiny hand reaches through the slats of the crib. Gripping my shirt, you tug me closer. My heart is squeezed to the point of bursting. It doesn’t. It is contained- kept whole- by your little fingers. I am wide awake.

I wish I could find the words. I want to tell you that I never knew anything before you. I didn’t have any substance until you had presence. I truly wasn’t until you actually were. I am because you are. You are too young to get it. I’m not sure I could ever really explain.

I rise to my knees again. I hover over you. I am the scattered remains of a useless life you shattered. Shattered and made whole.

“Little boy,” I say. “You are magnificent Saturn. I am the rings that tumble endlessly in your orbit. I am dust made meaningful. I have purpose because you are. I am nothing without you.”

“Sure,” you say and point again to the floor. “Now Daddy sleep.”