Figure

In afternoon sun, I sit

on the stoop, alone.

Past the yard, my brother's

little boy and girl

jump white squares of a chalked walk.

She wears a headband.

The boy's blond curl lifts

an instant after each jump, slightly -

not like your heavy long hair,

glinting, black, slapping

water across white squares

when you stood from your bath

and whipped your head down -

your habit not so much haste

as impatience. Now as I notice

another man's children, I am caught

in the leap of that curl, untangled

and dropped into air.