On learning of your father's nearness
to death I light another
cigarette, inhale the
thought, search for
comforting words. I filter
cliches, find none
to alter what a lifetime of
smoking creates.

So I sit, exhaling circles
blue questions - how's it going?
how much longer? how can you cope
knowing good-bye is imminent?

When you call, whispering,
he's gone, it's over,
I sputter sympathy, butt
cigarette in ashtray,
and pray
my children won't watch
tobacco take my last breath.

by Bernadette L. Wagner

Until very recently, I worked at home, raising my children and trying to squeeze out writing time. Currently, I'm the Internet Resource Centre Co-ordinator at the YWCA of Regina, a member of the Board of the Saskatchewan Writers Guild, chair of the Connaught Community Playground Project and I'm still trying to squeeze out writing time. I've had some success: I have had work published in CV2, SEEDS and Agniezka's Dowry and have work upcoming in _Room of One's Own_, a feminist literary journal.