Dying
must take more attention than I ever imagined.
Just when she’d compose herself
and seem fixed on the work before her,
Mother would fret, trying to help her
just one more time: Look for the light,
until I took her arm
and told her wherever I was in the world
I would come back, no matter how difficult
it was to reach her, if I heard her calling.
Shut up, mother, I said, and Annie died.