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When I was very young
About five or six years old
My mother bought a remnant of cloth
From a local mill
A six-by-six piece of material
With unfinished edges and out-of-square
In some unbelievably soft synthetic fabric
Colored black and white
In an unidentifiable pattern
I think she paid a dollar
At the time
She bought it to sit on
While she watched us at the pool
The benches too uncomfortable
She could sit on the grass
And read her book
And smoke her cigarette
There is a hole in the blanket from one...
Perhaps the one that contributed
To her death...I don't know...
But it melted a small hole
The size of a fingertip
Where the ashes had burned
I claimed the blanket as my own
When I was about ten or eleven
We were old enough then
To go to the pool alone
And the blanket had been designated
To be sent to charity
As all of our old clothes and toys
Often were
But I snagged the blanket from the pile
And placed it on my bed
To comfort me at night
The black blanket hid many things
From prying eyes
Candle-wax peeled off its fur
And blood washed clean with no stains
It hid nakedness and teenage sex
And once contained the evidence
Of teenaged drinking uncontrolled
When I married the blanket moved with me
And I often used it to snuggle
In a chair
Or to throw around my nakedness
When I awoke
When my daughter was born
We often lay side by side
On the kitchen floor
As I played with her to keep her quiet
While he slept in the next room
It traveled in her buggy
When I took her for walks
The German winters did not have much snow
But they were cold
The blanket traveled home with us
On the airplane
And stayed in her crib
Then adorned the foot of her bed
As she grew
She allowed me to use it
When her brother was small
He would lie on the living room floor
And learned to crawl
By grasping the soft material
In his hands
As soon as he could walk
She claimed it back, however
Stating that nothing else had ever match
Its softness or cuddling warmth
It rests now upon her couch
The favored throw for naps
Or late night TV watching
It remains unchanged
Through countless washings and
Two lifetimes of secrets
It holds, silent and softly
Remnants of Life