I gave quiet care today, quiet turns, quiet braids, quiet drips changed quietly.

I spoke in quiet, small sentences, I brushed hands against shoulders in quiet ways, I settled into the familiar panic of an ICU day quietly.

One patient of mine quietly went from dying to DYING, not distressfully, but quickly, persistently.

I only got loud once, when I was forced to transfer her during her exit, hurrying to settle her in to her new room before death quietly silenced.

My urgent noise disturbed the quiet of her tiny, sunny space and its big, old-fashioned window-wall. To me, it was odd that the windows wouldn’t open, that the window ledge didn’t house a field of plants.

Then, again quietly, I left her with her daughter, the braid I gave her quietly coming undone, her breathing quietly subsiding to the noise of her dying.