The Orange Window

The miners' changing hall of a Ruhr coal mine on a winter dawn, work clothes hanging from roof chains, on a wooden bench an opened resuscitation case, a worn honey-brown wooden box sixty-six centimetres long with two brass catches, in the raised lid a plain cream rubber bag and a black leather pouch, in the box a round gauge with a white dial, plain with a bare pointer, an oblong housing with a raised cover of glowing yellow-orange celluloid, brass pipes, two dark cloth-wrapped hoses to a metal breathing mask held by hands in brown leather sleeves, an empty canvas stretcher with a grey blanket beside the bench, warm lamplight.