That Christmas, Those Yankee PJs

Those pjs are no longer put on: old, a mommy hand-me-down—
are reminiscent of that Christmas (before planned to cut up now);
when I came home for break, not yet dismissed, from Uni,
came home for wisdom teeth surgery,
and for the flu.

It was a time, an abundance of time, to gather my Self,
to better (I did, somewhat, I did)
a time under the weather—
again, again, again—sigh.
Like a natural, normal thing of mine. It’s done. No more.

Those pjs were worn, marked NY Yankees and baseball-striped.
Why must I—
have to connect that Christmas to them? Or my
sentiment…totality?

It’s a natural, normal thing:
a natural thing, a normal thing
That makes all the sense and none of the sense

to miss the incense of that Christmas,
to miss it whole and full and arguably

to have worn it and drunk my broth.

But it wasn’t a special time.
Just a time, a break from the Alone,
a break from the Afar, the dorm.

And I had those pjs before, furthermore—long before that
Christmas, when I wore it most and
came to associate the times with the closest
I had for a wish, that Christmas.

I cannot cut them up;
cut them up, I do not.
I don them; I wear them again.

It is done.