battered felt · 54 · winter · worn 1873
a small top hat — a child's, perhaps, or a stunted version sized down
for a boy who climbed flues. the felt is hard with old soot. a piece
of pale straw is tucked into the band, kept for luck.
the dent in the crown is from a beam in the dark, struck the morning
he learned to count the chimney pots by touch. the soot will not come
out. it has stopped being soot and become the hat itself.
winter mostly, when chimneys ran hot every day and there was always someone wanting the flues opened. the boy who wore it grew taller and gave it on.
field-note: a thumbprint inside the brim, smaller than yours. he did not press hard.
silk top · winter fur · homburg · chimney swift · child