The first stanza sounds like a confident crowd selling protection. "We" have fine fabric, gunbelts, helmets, gold, and a hat that will keep you safe, a cloak that will end your pain. It reads like a sales pitch, but the last image gives it away: a parade where everyone wears "mirrors of our own devising." These people only see themselves reflected back, and the clothes are less about helping than about showing off.
The second stanza turns to a question: where is the little child? The speaker searches odd places, a street of clowns, a frozen river, under a coat, in a throat that has been forced shut. The child seems to stand for a vulnerable, honest self that the "new clothes" have buried or silenced. The final lines are blunt and painful: hearing your fear exposed feels like death. The mood moves from brisk and boastful to anxious and tender, with a sense that real feeling has been hidden under all that polish.