We can’t believe it’s the first time
I’m seeing one in five decades
on the planet, Josh who is ten
and a collector, a connoisseur
of salamanders, and me his late-
middle-aged stepdad. “They live
on every continent except Antarctica,”
he says, holding it up to my nose for a better
first look at this two-inch worm with a head
and arms and legs and, incredibly,
fingers and toes, that he found
under a rock this morning. And I think
I have been living under a rock myself—
the wrong rock—because I’ve never
seen one of these little miracles with digits
in my entire life. Or maybe I did
and just don’t remember because
there was no one around like Josh
holding it up to my nose in the shared
cup of his own amazement. I think we
learn to love the world from those
who loved the world before us. But sometimes—
especially lately—those are the ones who
came after us, reaching up to touch
our shoulder, saying: Look at this miraculous
living thing I am holding in my hands
and you are holding in your hands, too.