Tell me a story mother
All the hospital windows
Are black with snow

Tell me a story mother
Nurses are gathering fire
Doctors are measuring wire

Tell me a story mother
When does our care
For what is ours wear

Tell me a story mother
What we lose in time
We receive in kind

Tell me a story mother
Memory is a medicine
Exceeding what has been

Tell me a story mother
Soil is buried in soil
And grief in toil

Tell me a story woman
Death is the meaning
Of mother in my flesh

Tell me a story mother
The sick are waking
It is night and it is morning