All summer and fall
my Flexible Flyer
clung like a moth
to the basement wall.

Then would come that morning
when white was the only color,
when the school bus couldn’t come
and my father took it down.

He waxed the red runners
and we went outside together.
The world was ours to explore.

When I die, I can’t imagine
the last thing I’ll remember,
the last words I will say.

But I want death
to be like my father
in his big boots and heavy sweater,
lifting down my sled for winter,
taking me with him into the day.

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