Sounds Like "Chan Choo"

“What do we say?” I ask
the two year-old whose
raising is my task.

He answers me in the cold
playroom, “Sit!” still
needing to be told

the magic word when
you want someone to follow
an order set as question.

His “pease” rings hollow
among the toys whose parts
I hope he doesn’t swallow.

I jump when he starts
for my naked desk
to practice his dark arts

on mousepad and blotter.
In my weary arms
he is slick as an otter,

barking, “Mine, mine”
at my hand and all he sees,
as all that was once the line

between me and them
disappears in sippy cups
and apothegm

about ways to change
a soggy diaper,
while not to estrange

myself from the tongue
I spoke before I was
devoured by my young.