Blue Coat

Blue Coat

We’ve been together too long
What will you tell me that I don’t already know?

Trees are whispering to each other
In this place we are naked, listen to the cold

Slipping through us, as if we’re visible,
Somehow we’ve forgotten how to matter,

How to mean anything. Trees tell us nothing
Dressed in their white cloaks. Tall brides

Wed to winter. Alone I’ve forgotten.
I am the sparrow. I am the blue coat.



You must push their shiny heads into warm fabric,
quickly because your father is waiting in the car
and your mother is silent,
you are invisible, slipping into her pocket and she is gliding past;
a penny on the slippery floor. Then she is gone,
you know she is gone before the car
pulls out of the driveway. You are alone.
The coat does not matter.


My death will be blue.
I will say to my children
dress me in clouds, slip rings of water
around my wrists. Let me beautiful.
Let me be light.