"The Mind of a Child is a Dark Wood"

It's so hard to grasp
Watching her
Seeing how alert she is
Observing her learn
From scratch
At speeds no adult can match

That she will remember
None of this 
Herself

Not as herself

That for all the obvious
Personality she already has
And possibly always will be

She has not yet started
Being an awareness of self
As self 
Observing itself

An awareness that counts 
Her episodic memories
In the miserly fashion of all of us
Carefully hedging our stores
Against whirling oblivion
That ineluctable cyclone
That vortex
That ever-approaching storm 

That right this
Moment is
All she already
Ever knows 

Of exactly right
This moment
That she knows