C LARA, you may serve the breakfast." I systematically arranged the dishes, placing the warm plate directly in Iront of my sister, Emma Mar. As I handed her the tarnished silverware, I noticed gray wisps that had come loose from her bun.

T h e clover field stretches down a long hill to a cluster of trees Where a pony stands, flicking his tail at persistent flies. Above the hills to the west, the sun is buried in a wall of boiling thunderheads. T h e boy watches as a cool, yellow silence drifts across the fields...

A YEAR had passed since Eric had seen his parents. One wandering, wasted year. First Des Moines and then Omaha, then Bismark, and Butte, and the others. All of them alike, except that Omaha was bigger than Des Moines, and Seattle was bigger than Portland...

Sometime you've got to face Running into yourself in the fog, And admit you can't erase The ledger of twenty-two years, And this grand barrage Of nothing but open space And the sky you're leaving behind, Not ever knowing exactly why...