My Santiago

Endings

It was a somewhat typical night,

Our household being what it is;

Eccentric, nocturnal, prone to obsession

to do and to keep doing

and finish what we started,

In one headlong rush.

Tuesday January 21 st 2003!

A simpler time,

The first of our four parents

to move on!

I remember thinking, much later,

Sadly,

That Donald had passed in Adelaide,

Even while I was watching summer Tennis,

Fran, working on a Life Course,

Jay writing scripts;

Strange how it happens…

These things.

In another place,

At the same time,

The life of a loved one

was ebbing away.

The insistent ring of the phone,

Shrill at 12.30,