Snowman

 

Lived in half breaths

taken with one lung

christened in haste 

for expected brevity

given a half name

 

Bert

 

Bert

not Albert

or Herbert

or the apocryphal Plain Bert

as inscribed by the officer at the Labour Exchange 

 

Bert

 

the name that lasted him for seventy years

of milking, ploughing, hedging, making hay, cobbling

and hooking rugs from tufts of wool

 

Bert

 

he was a quiet man -

(breathless ballast to his wife’s dramatic gloom)

my auntie said he was funny sometimes

(wry joke teller in the corner of the room)

 

Bert

 

from his late twenties

a double thatch of white

clung each side of his bald patch

 

he never lost his hair completely

white

as a limestone quarry,

as seagull feathers,

as bleached bones,

white

as his nickname.