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INTERMISSION   She stabilised She started dying and then stopped My brother said her aneurysm had sealed       stuck   between a kidney and her spine with no place for blood to leak I’m on the way out         she kept saying to friends and family daring them to say she wasn’t Perky       almost belligerent   It was always hard for her to feel valued Her combative talk was more loving than sugary words   She was surprised how many people wanted to speak to her       say goodbye see her one more time       weak as she was   people who never cried started weeping on the phone she cheered them up with bedside gossip          tell me       how many men        did your mother           sleep with       really?   I held my mobile to her ear so she could chat with my daughter in Colombia   a grandson in Barcelona another in Palestine and her sister-in-law   in a bad way too who said in her soft voice I shall follow you soon     THE BUS TO SOLITUDE   I ask the driver to tell me when we reach Schloss Solitude I don’t speak German   I did once       my mum knew it she took a mini-gap-year in Germany 1937 why on earth did her parents send her there then or was it Berne       why didn’t I ask?   German for me was one of those paths not taken I’ve mostly forgotten       except the sound some grammar       a few songs   but the driver seems to say that when we get to Solitude I’ll know and of course there’s a sliding screen   with Next Before and After clearly marked in rolling surtitles like Stations of the Cross We bowl through the streets of Stuttgart   the road begins to climb through a deciduous muddle of forest coming into full green foil each leaf jumping out of bud   a promise my mother will never see again          burgeoning  she used to say       with a grin at the fancy word   We are on a mountain with a castle on the summit       like the story she loved as a child       I have her copy there will be mines below       a princess   who has to be kept safe from underworld goblins plotting to flood the mines and take over the kingdom   and a winding stair       leading to a secret chamber where magic will take place on its own terms which appear to other people as an empty