Finite (Happy National Poetry Month!)

Finite

By Hannah Six

I promised   

a heron

 slate-feathered   

   bare-limb balanced 

who tilted his head   

and  an interlude

of                         ice petals

stuttering and              livid  

singing       with envy 

         and other longings 

these years — pale tides   

swift and teeming  

— or hollow 

as a distant train 

scoring the still surface 

of 3 a.m.   waking

you asked  ordinary 

things   I promised 

to tell   some  

and you taught 

patience  and I hoped 

you would 

be so   

yet   supine   peering 

into snowfall   

testing 

each crystal blessing 

remember

how you dreamt 

you had grown old  

thin  days 

imprecicely numbered 

(c) 2022, by Hannah Six