Blue (for Lisa)

It was a hard December this year.

Ornaments that usually wrap warmth

Around me like a quilt 

Made me cry instead--

The clay angel I made with Becky

In her kitchen while snow fell soft outside

And the radio hummed soft inside—

The enamel rocking horse ridden by three little boys 

My sister-in-law sent me

From New York the Christmas after 

We had lost a fourth—

The pipe cleaner elf sitting on a 

Tinsel chair that hung from my childhood tree

When my father, unknowing of his future,

Scrambled in the moment to create designs

For teams of teenage boys with stiff crewcuts,

Drawing x’s and o’s on a yellow pad of paper

While I sat on his lap and wondered what

This strange map meant--

At first I tried to unhear the song 

Of losses that curved through this December’s air

Around me until finally I accepted it,

Placed the notes of that song on the altar 

Of my heart and allowed it to be what it wanted,

What it needed to be.

Blue.