Elegy for Kevin

I picture you leaving your coat on the hood.Wallet and keys. The crisp envelope.

We all know what it's like to imaginethe thing—how glaring and suddenly close

the tools are if you need them: a stoplight,a prescription. A few feet of rope.

Or that joke of a pistol you chose at thepawn shopand loaded, and unloaded, and cleaned,

then tucked in your belt, like when you were seven,as you crossed a hayfield by the road,

where a sudden breeze lifted the endless gray finchesand lit the bright backs of the leaves—

your face the stunned face of a prisoner thenat the gateway through which he's released.