The Dead Man\'s Clothes

The Dead Man\'s Clothes

The Dead Man\'s Clothes

The dead man’s clothes
were willed to the village orphans
so that, those long summer evenings,
he was everywhere,
moving through the fields
until the sun went down,
bloodily.

The villagers loved it, calling
Gretel, Hansel, Romulus,
and watching the old man’s shoulder turn
or the big baggy arse
that was his alone come
to a sudden, billowing halt.

Except his wife. Unable
to decide whether this was flattery
or insult, she kept herself
to herself, shut up inside,

while the village orphans
came in from the fields, their hands
reddened from picking berries
and trailing mothballs in the street
like puffs of light.