It’s been years now since you drifted
into the silence years since you dug
a bed in the snow for us
since we lay down your tail over your nose
your forepaw over my shoulder
the blue of your eyes unreal unreal
and the stars
the stars played their tricks with time
and space years it’s been
or perhaps we’ve not met yet
not eyed one another warily
nor made our constellation of two Canis Minor
not yet risen not yet
perhaps we haven’t parted
those last days still to come
on the cusp of spring
snow becomes water once again
running
perhaps that is why I think of you
the way you ran blue-eyed
as water when I was winter.