Backyard rink

Obstacles

I put the red wine on the back porch
behind the bag of forgotten lawn seed
beside a bent hand shovel.

A frozen pair of his sandals,
so large, slows the way,

our second boy’s,
once of the drooling smile
and little crab feet,
back when we could hold our liquor.

We tried a tomato garden one spring
and one winter built a skating rink
all posts and bright hard plastic.

The sandals are soldiers,
rigid and gaunt and solemn.

Step around them, watch the broken rake,
and brace for the cold
through the door that doesn’t close.
Go, drown those sorrows.