Coathooks

Blue jeans freshly washed
hang by the beltloop
from one of a golden row
of coathooks, legs crossed
and stiffened with starch,
fly gaping like a mouth.
The awkward way it hangs
it is a big tuna of cotton
hung up at the lip,
its zipteeth gasping, frayed
threads spread like whiskers,
the pockets turned out
white gills drowning in air
as it dries above the radiator,
fat and salty and beautiful,
good enough to eat, or wear.

A jacket hangs by its side,
battered, burnt leather
like a ghost made of chocolate
from a kind of funhouse,
a cow's hide stretched over hooks.