Another morning in March, I am woken up by the phone ringing. A voice I recognize as my mother’s As I slowly drop my grogginess like a blanket.

I imagine her calling from that dimly lit Distant room, as she tells me to do something today, After wishing me happy birthday, many Returns (or is it reruns?) of the day etc.

I nod as I see how one corner of the window That faces southeast is already bronze. The pink quince, I had placed in the water Last evening, have already paled.

I tell myself not to thread metaphors Of dread, death and dying into things. Let the ideas about living be separate From life, as being alone is from silence.

There I shall shuttle between work and the job That enables me to do this work I am meant to do in long hours of the years left, This slow fashioning of required lines and nets.

The call had ended and I am here working.