A Growing Boy

My baby has started to eat solid food.

He devours the baby-cereal-mush and pureed produce with gusto.
His deliciously-rolled thighs
and rubber-band wrists
excitedly pump back and forth
as the spoon approaches.
His mouth stretches open
in anticipation.
The food goes in,
the boy swallows -
(he allows hardly any to ooze back out,
as the eating novice is wont to do) -
and grins, demonstrating his
absolute delight in this tastiness.

While he revels,
a slight pang of sadness pinches my mostly-happy heart.
The box of baby oatmeal in my pantry
and rubber-covered spoons in my cabinet
mean that my tiny guy is growing up.

Soon he won't need bottles.
Soon he'll be walking.
Soon he'll be able to prepare his own food.
Soon he'll be a young man, no longer my tiny boy.

But then I notice that his eyelashes are encrusted
with the liquid-pasty mixture.
Then I see it in his belly button.
Then I glimpse it smeared between
those delectable toes of his
and I remember
that he's still tiny enough
to laugh as I idly kiss those toes for hours
(as I am wont to do.)

And I think -
maybe I don't have to get quite so sad -
just yet.