This old stone house feels chilly for July.
Even the moon above the ridge looks cold.
At her age, she can go warm up in bed.
Will power, strong as ever, snuffs the thought.
She hears bells sounding from the village church.
But is it some particular hour now?
Lord above, has she forgotten something?
She’ll ask her old friend Jane, who rings the bells.
Night or day’s the same to me, says Milton.
He lives next-door. He’d claim the chill means death.
It’s all the poor man seems to contemplate.
She finds the subject boring more than grim.
When blood stops pumping, that can be the end.
A sudden urge to speak surprises her.
Scraps of a Bible verse come back to mind:
… the words of our lips and meditations...
Her memory just isn’t what it was.
Let them be acceptable… and so on.
Her husband would have known the Psalm no doubt.
He’d likely know the whole damned thing, she thinks.
She’d wait him out as he recited it.
There were more times like that than she can count.
It’s not so bad to have no aims in life.
In fact she likes it, has for quite some while.