Presence

Mid-November, the year races towards its end

frantically; time, the clock says, counts

in a measured, tick-tock regularity               

but the older you get the faster it goes.

2017: an eventful year for the world

and for me; but for the world every year

must be eventful. For myself, I look back

on many good things: we went to Singapore,

I sold my haunted house

after almost two years of trying, I bought

a new computer, a new car … the material,

important banalities

that have such presence in our lives.

One thing, though, stands out: in August

just shy of her 93rd birthday, my mother died,

in a mixture of tragedy

and relief. It’s at least three years

since she’s had any measure

of the world she once controlled. I got the call

and flew the next morning, but she had died

the night before. Does that bother me now?

I used to think Woody Allen’s “I’m not scared

of dying, I just don’t want to be there

when it happens” Jewish-hilarious.

The last time I had visited

was the first time she didn’t know

who I was, though for years

she hasn’t known my name.

A good year: festivals, friends’ book launches,

a trip to Adelaide, a first to Kangaroo Island,

a tour of fascinating Japan, nice

modifications to my life. My mother

died quietly, almost abstractedly; my brothers

and sister and I of course knew, but she

wasn’t there when it happened.