The Drowned Children

You see, they have no judgment. So it is natural that they should drown, first the ice taking them in and then, all winter, their wool scarves floating behind them as they sink until at last they are quiet. And the pond lifts them in its manifold dark arms. But death must come to them differently, so close to the beginning. As though they had always been blind and weightless. Therefore the rest is dreamed, the lamp, the good white cloth that covered the table, their bodies. And yet they hear the names they used like lures slipping over the pond: What are you waiting for come home, come home, lost in the waters, blue and permanent.