Minneapolis

Sunlight that dazzles off snow that sparkles. More theaters per capita than New York. Scarlet fire hydrants, with bright yellow caps and mittens on their single arms, stand in the snow at street corners like toytown policemen directing traffic.

My 6-week-old goddess-baby, Araminta, is an amalgam of nuzzly softs: thistledown hair, translucent skin, tiny snub nose dotted with baby acne, floppy neck, scalp that shifts and quivers under kisses - and steely sharps; marble-blue don't-mess-with-me eyes, a cry that could slice concrete. Araminta was Harriet Tubman's given name, which tells you something about the politics of Araminta's parents, my friends Pablo and Andrea. That and the fact that they asked me to be her godmother - and were delighted when I promptly amended it to goddess-mother. In my poem for her birth, I wrote:

"This child will never know
how not to make the personal
political; how not to believe
the political possible; how not
to throw her whole heart
into the struggle; how not to dance
in the journey to freedom."