"One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.
‘And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!"

With poetry book poised in her left hand, glasses on the tip of her nose, Camille focused as carefully as she could on the strange English words. They were practically nonsense some of them to her, but still she read.

The chair was drawn to the head of the bed, her left elbow rested on the edge of the mattress, reading by the light of the lamp on the bedside table, the winter sun long set. The fingers of her right hand smoothed gently through dark curls upon the pillow, soothing, dulcifying the mind beneath them. Heavy eyelids blinked drowsily over unfocused blue eyes, a faint, serene smile beneath.

"O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!’
He chortled in his joy.
‘Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe."

On reaching the end of the verse, Camille lowered her well loved poetry book, laying it flat on the gap on the edge of the bed not far from her son's chin, and turned the pages with her left hand, her right not ceasing in their caress.

"Close your eyes my beamish boy," she spoke gently, "close your eyes and listen. I'll be here, you're safe." The slow blinks subsided, bright blue extinguished behind pale eyelids. Camille continued to turn pages, settling at one, longer poem she remembered.

"Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary…

Between verses she glanced to watch for the telltale slow in breathing, the heavy head. The arrival of long-absent sleep to an exhausted body and mind.

"…here I opened wide the door; -

A quiet snore escaped pale red lips.

Darkness there, and nothing more…"