Unfinished

I see the Covid numbers 
Now edging toward 400,000 souls lost
In our country.
I mourn the deaths, the losses.

I think of the
Songs unfinished,
Last chapters of the novel unwritten,
The paintings half done,
The ungraded homework,
The incomplete research proposal and empty lab.

And the words unsaid—
Of love
Of forgiveness
Of reconciliation.

I worry for the next departures—
Thinking of those this world cannot lose.
Names pass through my mind—
That poet, that scientist, that young athlete,
That film maker, that historian,
My best friend.

There is good yet to be accomplished.
Things yet to know.
Words yet to be said.

—Sue Martin
December 2020

Wash up Mask up Separate Vaccinate