I came of age in a Captainless ship. We all went down one by one. Which may be why these wintry nights with wild winds evoke terror inside. Or maybe too, in another life, I perished at sea, and I’m almost certain that’s true because I don’t want to know. Just the thought of it almost extinguishes me, while I write at the kitchen table with the sun rising over the mountains, a wave of light cresting the satiny snow, as the tea kettle whistles and the woodstove ticks and the timbers of this frame raised by neighbors creaks with the last few gusts before the sap on this hill begins to run.