The Hour Without Errands

Three o'clock, and the room arranges itself — chair, book, half-cup of tea gone cool while I wasn't watching. Sebald, open at the herring page, the one I did not finish yesterday, the one that did not finish me. The street has agreed to be small for an hour: a bus, a dog, the postman late and unrepentant. The small task I had been meaning to do waits, patient, unoffended. I drink the cool tea. It is fine.