I had one of those magical twin parenting moments the other night on the drive home from a sunset picnic with family, on cliffs overlooking the ocean. My pair of 19-month old babies ran wild in the grass and salt spray air all evening, in rapture with their freedom and the belief that they were the center of the universe. I was reminded of a Pablo Neruda poem I’d read earlier in the week in The Sea and the Bells, one of the eight books of poetry he wrote from his island home in the last year of his life:

 Gracias, violines, por este dia
 de cuatro cuerdas. Puro
 es el sonido del cielo,
 la voz azul del aire.
 I am grateful, violins, for this day
 of four chords. Pure
 is the sound of the sky,
 the blue voice of air.

On the drive home, along the swaying inky blue black mountain road, my husband navigated through the starry night in the front, while I sat between the two car seats in the back to help ease the boredom of the long bedtime drive. I rested my palms on each baby’s belly, feeling the differences in their uniquely exquisite bodies and the movements of each little breath. I sang. The girls requested songs by name in the truncated family patois that makes up our daily life together: “Ashes” with a head sway and a lilting upswing of the voice means Ring Around the Rosie. “Row Row” with a violent forward and backward jerk of the torso of course means Row Row Row Your Boat. I complied with each request through our usual rotation of songs.
Then Maka said, “Dee Da Da?” I had no idea what she meant.
“Dee Da Da?” I asked her. “What is Dee Da Da?”
Momi picked up her hand and shook it like she was ringing the little bells they’d been given at a Christmas parade over a month ago, and sang in tune, “Dee Da Da, Dee Da Da,” so that I understood.
“Jingle Bells?” I asked, not realizing they knew that song.
“Yeah!” Momi answered, almost as surprised as I was by the clarity of her voice.
“Maka?” I turned and asked. “Is that what you meant?”
“Yeah!” she yelled, kicking her feet.
And so we sang Jingle Bells all the way down the mountain long after Christmas had passed, filling the night sky with our delight. I wouldn’t call it twin speak, exactly, but a glimpse into the ephemeral world of sibling dialogue when language is just beginning to emerge, like a newborn gecko (or ghetto, as we call them in our house) slithering tentatively out of its egg shell into the sunlight.

 Gracias, violines, por este dia