In My Father’s Coat

 His coat speaks the same language

as a thin younger man

walking in cold air

far beyond the black line of trees

wrapped in the lining

of his thin young coat

satin warming his bones

and circling his shoulders

done up to his neck

with that last stiff button 

thinking of every mud filled ditch

his angular legs had crossed

childhood stretched like the skin

of a drum over the wound of himself

his father’s judgement still in his ears

pale hands deep in his pockets

raucous flashes of egg thieving crows

mourned his harsh landscape

perhaps it was now he unbuttoned

his coat and invited the blue night in

on a lost horizon a faraway train

rattled uncomprehendingly fast

dragging the future along

there was no turning back

no soft dawn or twinkling lights

carrying a suitcase with nothing inside

he was one step away from us

crumpled, torn in the lining

praying into the emptiness

cursing the dark holed sky.