A Dedicatory, where this would have started if I wasn't so concerned with chronology

I think I see her in your eyes,
The daughter I would have had had.
She glows behind your flushing cheeks,
Your lustrous smile, your swelling tummy.
She is the hero I would write,
The dedication that I pen;
She hides behind every solitary line:
I think she is the best of me.
It is to her I dedicate my life;
She is the beauty of my soul:
The poem that I would write,
Her face that I would sketch,
Her story I would tell.
And yet she only lives inside me
Because you are too far away to tell.
Instead, enclose her in the words,
Make of them a little womb,
A nest for my baby bird
That I will happily defend
Until she is full grown
And then I say that I have lived
And then I say that I have loved.
I have loved.