I am sixteen & the slide
of my holed shoes,
wet, made not for this,
carries me down the silvery ice
into the snow-dusted shrubs,
powdering my hair & shocking
my chest, exposed
by the missing one of the black
buttons on my mother’s
thin coat, sewn for September,
not this jagged-toothed
January. My eyes are glacial,
& snow, now melted, creeps
toward the button of my jeans.
The news at six o'clock
reports the dissolve of everything
I know. They report it to my father,
who aptly listens & shakes his head
at everything, everything, everything.
I, having hardened to the frigid,
I close my eyes, I grind my teeth,
& I go on, for this is what I know
of fear.