Oh, Of Course, I Always Feel Unconfident.

It Is Coincidence, I Decide, And I Am Getting Old And Batty, Thinking The Universe Revolves Around Me.

Beside Mama, In My Own Folding Chair, With My Feet Sticking Out In Front Of Me, I Thought About My Own Innards. Just A Few Months Before I'd Had No Idea Whether My Reproductive Equipment Worked. There Was No Evidence. But That Week I Had Become A Full-fledged Bleeder And Was Still Absorbed By This First Change In Myself That I Had Ever Noticed. The Click And Buzz Of My Synapses Kept Making The Same Connection. If You Can Change, You Can Also End. Death Had Always Been A Theory To Me. Now I Knew. The Terror Hurt Good And I Nursed It And Played It Like A Loose Tooth.

We Survive Until, By Sheer Stamina, We Escape Into The Dim Innocence Of Our Own Adulthood And Its Forgetfulness.

I Think That It's Really Important To Go Away And Come Back.

Just As A Snowflakewent On To Feed A Puddle That Filled A Stream And Then The River, Thepumpkin Patch Is A Gathering Of Molecules From My Old Goats, Chickens,and Cats, Feeding The Underworld Of Dirt Creatures. And Somewhere, Myfather's Ashes Mingle With Birds, Air, And Sea.