Else’s flat had rooms on a string.
The kitchen and pantry with potion jars in rows.
The only pantry I have known outside books.
The room with the dark floor and the bed where my grandfather died,
and I slept.
The living room where she read for herself
and to me behind gauze curtains.
Once the story of a mother chasing Death
who took her child while she slept.
The mother gave her hair
to the winter-crone
and her eyes to the river
to be told where Death had gone.
Rooms, pantries are kinder.
They set no terms
during those long winter afternoons
when time takes a step sideways.