Stone Cold All the Way Through

The pew was cold before I sat—

not draft-cold, not November-cold,

the kind that lives inside the flat

of wood too dense to ever hold

a body's warmth. An hour,

a room packed full of coat and grief,

and still that particular scour

against my thighs. No relief

from any of it. Someone's father

was being named up front.

I barely knew the son. I'd rather

have been anywhere. The blunt

cold of the kneeler. Candles

doing almost nothing at all.

A smell I can't name—handles

of something old beneath the floral.

The air in there never quite closes

around you. I left the same

temperature I came in. As losses

go it's minor. All the same—

outside was warmer.

November, sidewalk, exhaust.

I stood there and felt the cold

fall out of me.

Just stood there.