TRANSCRIPT

I’m Maggie Smith, and this is The Slowdown.

It can be so difficult to ask for what you need from the people in your life, especially when you’re lonely, or anxious, or depressed. You might not even know exactly what you need from loved ones, or what would make you feel better.

If you’re lucky, you have friends who might sense the shift in your emotional weather: the clouds rolling in, the sky darkening. If you’re very lucky, those friends might know what to do without being asked or prompted. They might come over with takeout and offer a listening ear. They might pick you up and take you to the movies or to a concert, to get you out of your bubble. Or maybe they come over and just simply exist with you. Maybe sitting next to you, maybe watching TV, maybe not talking at all, all without expecting you to be cheerful or even sociable. Their presence is calming in itself. Their unconditional love and acceptance, even when you’re not sparkling.

Feeling supported by your friends can be extra challenging when they live far from you. They might notice something is off via text or phone call, or from a lack of response, but they aren’t around to see how you’re really doing. A text, a call, or a Facetime can be just what you need. The point is showing up and being there — even from afar.

But when friends go the extra mile — literally — and travel to you, or invite you to visit them, it’s such a warm, comforting feeling. You know you matter.

Today’s poem speaks to the way we show up for our friends when they need us and the ways we can be saved by our friendships, even long-distance ones. The poem references the 2001 album Verspertine by Icelandic artist Björk. It’s been referred to as her “winter” record, frosty and quiet, with recordings of wintry sounds mixed into the songs.

Listening to Vespertine for Twenty Hours Straight
by Derrick Austin

The seventh track starts with the sound of someone walking through snow,
not fresh snow, but slightly hardened snow. It grounds the album, 
I tell them over the phone. They’re cutting tofu to batter and fry,
bowls and utensils clattering in the sink,
their voice, clear and steady.

Six more hours until I arrive, bleary and coarse—
I’m so broke they bought my Greyhound ticket. 
Ramshackle farms dot the flat landscape. 
I hate that you can’t hide in the Midwest:
fallow fields, no trees in the distance.

This depressive episode isn’t exactly an out of body experience:
it’s like there’s two of me in an unfurnished room,
one on the floor staring at the ceiling, the other standing and staring at the window,
and we don’t speak while the living in the living world continue
their errands and pursuits.

I’m gripping the photo of them studying in Rome,
the year we became friends.
In looping letters on the back,
they wrote three lines in Latin. I recognize 
the word for spring.

“Listening to Vespertine for Twenty Hours Straight" by Derrick Austin from THIS ELEGANCE © 2026 Derrick Austin. Used with the permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of BOA Editions.