They’ll go skating tomorrow on lakes and rivers
Frozen down and down
A real skater’s winter
Huge horses raised along the Scottish Clyde will pull sleighs
And kettles of chili and chowder, hot chocolate and coffee
Will be slopped into mitten-wrapped Styrofoam cups.

The snow-removal people are all complaining
We’ll go out of business
Expensive equipment and mountains of grit
Sitting around, waiting for snow.

Everything turned around and out of sorts
That skater’s winter Halloween
Inuit and Athabaskan girls dressed as ballerinas.

Plump and warm
Soft and buttery
Cut in the shape of two little hands,
Take a nibble
Get a giggle
Sugar cookies.

Mommy’s sweet pat-a-cakes
Made from love’s dough
Dimpled and delicious
Take a nibble
Get a giggle
Sugar cookies.

He doesn’t have my Cary Grant chin
He doesn’t have my eyes
Or my nose
Or my square jaw.

He’ll be tall like Daddy
With long hands and fingers
And Grandpa’s ears.

He doesn’t have my hair
Or my skin
But my oh my
Is he ticklish!
Just like Mommy.

Sway and sway
Two step, dip
Sway and sway again;
Cheek to cheek
Every night
The perfect partner on the floor.

Sometimes we rest in the rocker
I whisper “I love you” in his ear
Then back on the dance floor
Check to check
He never steps on my toes.

Sway and sway
Two step, dip
Sway and sway again;
My Fred Astaire
My darling boy
A dancing fool
For Mommy.

Two loaves of bread in each batch.
One loaf fresh, hot, and buttered for us
The other into the freezer to wait.

One loaf went to a new baby;
His mother sliced the bread
With the tiny one in one arm
And spread on marmalade.

One loaf went to new neighbors,
Strange people with teenagers
Who said thank you and closed the door.

Today one loaf went to a family Whose baby died,

A very wanted baby who died inside,
Its mommy lived near us so we left it,
A loaf on the doorstep with some flowers
To welcome home grief.

Two loaves of bread in each batch.
One loaf we eat ourselves,
The other into the freezer to wait.

I never got to meet you,
Little, tiny almost-child;
You slipped away
To the stars and the moon
And didn’t come back
To tell Mommy how beautiful they were.

Your big brother
And your not-so-big brother
And your great big Daddy
Were ready to love you;
Ready to let their hearts grow,
Ready to play and tease and wonder
What you thought about them.

So, as I look at the stars and the moon
Could you please let me know
How beautiful they are;
Because sometimes it’s hard
For me to see them at all
Without you here to hold my hand.

But today you changed:
Today you both ganged up on me.
Your brother poured out the Cheerios
In a mountain
On the green shag
While you danced
Crunch, crunch, crunch!
You danced on the Cheerios
And screamed in delight
At the discovery of what
You could do together

As brothers,
As boys
In kahoots.

And I stood there shocked.
Suddenly I had two sons;
Like Pinocchio,
You had turned into a real boy
Before my eyes
Before I was ready.

I didn’t know about him for a long time.
It had been an afternoon–an ordinary summer afternoon,
August 9, 1963;
I was home in the kitchen,
My mom was chopping something.
Patrick Kennedy had just died,
The President’s little baby boy,
I told my mother it made me sad.
She stopped.

In a soft voice,
A small, tight voice I’d never heard before,
Very, very far away,
She said, “That happened to me, too.”
Time stopped.

I stared at my mother,
This strange woman in my house,
Not just my mother anymore.
“He lived half an hour.”
My throat turned hard and dry;
“We named him after my father.”

He was gone forever,
I never said goodbye.
She had kept the hurt to herself all those years.

Now I have two babies
Perfect and alive;
And I think about that little brother,
A part of me,
Gone.
And I’m still trying to saying goodbye.

I stared out
Past the drapes
Past the tears
Past a layette I guess
I won’t be needing

To the mailbox.

Standing in the rain
The mail van had just come
Probably another sympathy card.

I wasn’t ready
For the walk out
To pull down the door
Slit the envelope
Open my heart
Let the grief flow again.

Maybe in another hour
Or two
I’ll go out
Or maybe I’ll leave
Another “I was so sorry to hear . . .”
For tomorrow.

And then suddenly
They were gone again;
Riding bikes, then skating
Then back to the hammock.

Just when I’d seen them
Out the front window,
I saw them laughing,
Sitting at the kitchen table
Shelling peanuts, reading comics.
Then they were off again
Back into the tree.

Little boys
Quick as starlings
Taking wing.