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D.J.REID
O’HARA’S HAT
Emily Thornton did not think of herself as a fussy woman, but she was. When she arrived at the park bench on which she was accustomed to sit most afternoons when the weather was fine, she was disconcerted to find a hat in the very spot where she always, always sat. For just a moment (and no longer, for she was a keenly self-possessed individual) she was stunned into inaction, looking first at the hat and then in either direction along the path. But there was no one in sight, and the hat remained fixed to the spot — “her” spot — as if it had always been there and had a right to be there, which, of course, it did not.
Thus, after a few moment’s further scrutiny, Emily sat down, taking an unaccustomed position on the bench next to the hat but far enough away to indicate to anyone who passed by that the hat, regardless that it was a man’s hat in any case, clearly did not belong to her. It was as though the hat had its place and she had hers, or at least a place that she was prepared to occupy temporarily now that the hat had displaced her.
On the whole, Emily might have thought, if she had not been put out by the hat’s being there in the first place, that the hat was rather handsome. No doubt it had been forgotten by a fashionable gentleman, a man of a certain age, because of course such hats are not worn by the young. Emily was aware of this because she, too, was of a certain age and wore, not merely because the weather had turned rather brisk but also out of a sense of fashion, a hat and matching gloves.
Someone was sure to miss this errant hat, and the sooner the better. Emily was mulling over this point when there hove into view around a bend in the path a stout, bespectacled man with ruddy cheeks and a shock of white hair that stood up from his forehead like a dollop of whipped cream. As he strode by, well shod in polished black brogues, his double-breasted gray topcoat well buttoned up, Emily thought, here’s exactly the sort of gentleman who would wear a fine, old-fashioned hat. And so she raised her voice and called after him, “Excuse me. Sir, excuse me.”
The old fellow stopped abruptly, turned in a befuddled sort of way, and finally brought his friendly green eyes to rest on Emily. “Were you speaking to me?” he rumbled, and then he cleared his throat and repeated the question, for he was a tenor, not a gravelly baritone.
“Yes, I’m sorry to trouble you. Do you mind?” Emily gestured him to her with a crook’d, nicely gloved finger.
“No, of course not.” Here’s a genial fellow, thought Emily, as he strode over to stand before her, bowing slightly in her direction. “Is there some problem?”
“I’m not sure it’s a problem exactly. No, I wouldn’t call it a problem.”
“How can I help?” He asked patiently.
“It’s about a hat,” Emily said, beginning now to gather her wits.
“A hat?”
“This hat.” She turned her gloved finger to the object in question.

Red Hawk

THE TRANSFORMATION

What prayer or magic spell or luck

leaves us breathless, thunder struck

just from looking in each other’s eyes

across the breakfast table? Surprise

of love comes as a kind of Divine Grace,

as if I’d never seen your face

before and now am stunned that you adore

the likes of me; whatever for

I do not know but now you’re stuck

and seem enamored of my face, its every ruck

and deep crevasse your sheer delight; it defies

all reason. Yet this spell causes us to rise

and with no word we tenderly embrace.

The sweetest feelings rush to fill the space

as if God came in through an open door

and we are nothing like we were before.

David Berman

SNOW

Walking through a field with my little brother Seth

I pointed to a place where kids had made angels in the snow.

For some reason, I told him that a troop of angels

had been shot and dissolved when they hit the ground.

He asked who had shot them and I said a farmer.

Then we were on the roof of the lake.

The ice looked like a photograph of water.

Why he asked. Why did he shoot them.

I didn't know where I was going with this.

They were on his property, I said.

When it's snowing, the outdoors seem like a room.

Today I traded hellos with my neighbor.

Our voices hung close in the new acoustics.

A room with the walls blasted to shreds and falling.

We returned to our shoveling, working side by side in silence.

But why were they on his property, he asked.