Apprehension.
She looked at the clock.
It was still deeply dark but glimmers
of morning\'s wet fog
seeped thru\' drapes, mourningly dim.
She must not be late.
Between dressing she hastily packed
bags meanwhile telling
herself not to include anything black.
Her Dad had cheerful resilience and
would survive recent
bad illness just as he had in the past.
But time can sneak in.
The shrilling reproach to age of that
early phone-call made
its cold forewarning of heart attack.
The station loomed grey.
As a voice rallied passengers quickly
to seats she felt strange
apprehension while leaving the city.
Town buildings faded.
The shroud of fog lifted and thinned
when leaving suburbs
and lost was amorphous cloud quilts.
Cattle in wakening fields became but
a fuzz when train-speed
trailing indigo veiled them in muslin.
Then woolly air flushed.
Blur turned to luminous essence and
thrust shine-suffusion
on railway-lined gallop over the land.
Sun was declaring no truce.
Fog\'s blight of damp would be ended
soon and she welcomed
a positive herald of brightness ahead.
She stemmed back fear for her much
loved Dad suddenly
struck as girlhood memories flooded.
Then she started to pray.