Today's poem is by Danielle Pieratti

A Memory of Snow
       

Off-road, half-drunk, knee-deep
in ermine he doubled over,

took his fill of liquid
heaves, stalls and kick-starts,

laid him down
in towny white, his fail

a leaden night, then left me
in the gully by the tree line.

First his flare spilled over
the hill, then his sound,

till unfound I stood alone
by the oil spot the engine left.

Above, around, a sonogram
of stars—that quiet, moony

otherworld of clotted almost-light.
Again needing it against me,

I stand tonight
at the dark window

in this winter of dwindling
snow, where snow like an undue gift

returns dampered the bent
world, her body still and tumorless.

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Copyright © 2023 Danielle Pieratti All rights reserved
from Approximate Body
Carnegie Mellon University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission