She Has The Gift Of Accepting Her

The Most Compelling Narrative, Expressed In Sentences With Which I Have No Chemical Reaction, Or An Adverse One, Leaves Me Cold.

On The Screen I Saw Tanks Rolling Through Dusty Streets, And Fallen Buildings, And Forests Of Unfamiliar Trees Into Which East Pakistani Refugees Had Fled, Seeking Safety Over The Indian Border.

She Supposed That All Those Years Of Loving A Person Who Was Dishonest Had Taught Her A Few Things.

Isolation Offered Its Own Form Of Companionship: The Reliable Silence Of Her Rooms, The Steadfast Tranquility Of The Evenings. The Promise That She Would Find Things Where She Put Them, That There Would Be No Interruption, No Surprise. It Greeted Her At The End Of Each Day And Lay Still With Her At Night.

She Has Given Birth To Vagabonds. She Is The Keeper Of All These Names And Numbers Now, Numbers She Once Knew By Heart, Numbers And Addresses Her Children No Longer Remember.