Impervious (Day 100)

Photo: elbpresse

before before  

before I could turn 

it off   but I 

miss the morning 

all day now  and listen  

to the radio  

letting it 

cycle between 

news and music and 

holding each other 

in contempt 

feeling like we were 

living in an all-new 

better-than-before 

world   one where 

we had covens

of rich white men telling 

our bodies not to have 

ovaries or uteri

and we 

were oddly hopeful

hating  losing  fighting for 

a scant handful 

of freedoms

instead of shrinking 

from them 

and our country 

is impervious 

to our pain

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Backpacking with Madame Bovary (Day 84)

I am stretched out on
the floor of an unzipped tent,
reading Madame Bovary,
while the nylon sides
breathe in
and out,
each inhalation
and exhalation ending with
a muffled pop,
like distant sails on a blue bay.
A hot afternoon stretches
ahead of and behind me,
baking dust and melting
pine resin a delicate incense
gently teasing the dry breeze.
I, however, am
a century away, in a country
where no one speaks
my mother tongue,
flirting and curtseying
and yearning and knowing
each character's heart
as well
as I know my own.
But, the pleasure
of my company is requested,
on a foray in search of wild
trout for dinner,
and I realize my hair is damp
against my neck,
so I roll over, stretch,
unfurl myself from the floor
with the effortlessness
of nineteen years,
and bid Flaubert adieu
until nightfall, when
my flashlight and I will answer
the siren call of Madame Bovary—
and the tragedy of her
unfulfilled heart—once more.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Red Delicious (Day 79)

Source: US Dept of Agriculture*

Red delicious, the color 

of fall, of the garnet ring 

I used to wear, dreaming 

myself into fathomless 

depths, where flashes 

of amber mingled with 

the sweetness 

of late summer 

cherries—the colors, 

I thought, of a midnight sky, 

viewed through a glass 

of Gamay. Or, perhaps, a Merlot...

No matter. 

I treasure the shawl, knit 

with my own grateful hands 

in a pattern of diamond lace. 

But the ring? One day 

a jeweler shattered the stone 

and replaced it with one 

dark as sin, and opaque 

as the heart of the long-ago man 

who presented it to me. 

So I pawned it. 

Now, by the fire, in my red 

woolen shawl, I consider 

the ring and the man

and I think:

Good riddance to all bad apples.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

*	Artist: Mary Daisy Arnold, ca. 1873-1955. In collection of USDA.

Every Single Parakeet (Day 77)

He flicked the tip of his cigarette 

into a crystal ashtray—a wry object, 

he thought—and continued: 

"People believe the most 

expensive sentences they read, 

wanting to know what's inside 

every single parakeet and canary,

what's happening in the past, 

in apricot nectar, and in Barbie's Dream 

Machine." The other guests nodded. 

One woman's steely bob swung 

forward and backward 

with each movement 

of her head, mesmerizing him. 

"Now, we turn to strategy instead 

of chopsticks," she said. "It's consistent,  

it's complicated, clean and direct, 

its everything to everyone." 

A moment of silence 

as twelve wineglasses were raised, 

as the scent of sophisticated 

pondering filled the room, like lilies 

on a hot day. A flushed, jovial man 

proposed a toast: "Do the right thing. 

Sign up—there's no reason not to!" 

The hostess sighed. Not for a moment 

had the gentle tapping 

of her fingernail on the table 

been interrupted.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

April Haiku (Day 76)

Morning rain dissolves
Sudden burst of sun, blue sky
Second dawn today



(c) 2017, by Hannah Six