Thirteen years old and bundled

against the chill, he pastes rags and papers

to a frame that's cockeyed, loose,

all droop and strange angles.

What the kite needs is a breeze to rise.

Sticks poking out, paper ripping,

it catches the smallest blown breath

like a dead leaf taking to flame,

and swings from his hands, swoops and glides.

He runs forward, unreels the spool.

Someday, he will go out, and instead of this wind

so cold it might be from heaven's iced dome,

he believes there will be a girl, freckled,

brunette, quick eyes and feet, warm as

the blue mittens on his hands, glad to run

alongside him, to fling puff ball dust

at him in the ironweed Fields,

and curl against him as he sleeps.

If he goes on running, it will

take him to a joy that breaks him.

He reels in the wind-torn kite

before it lifts him from his skin.