Sublime

conceit

“I’m Mrs. Burns-Cooper,” said the woman, “and after this, well, it’s all right this time, because it’s your first time, but after this time always use the back entrance.” There is a pear in my icebox, and one end of rye bread. Except for three Irish potatoes and a cup of flour and the empty Christmas boxes, there is absolutely nothing on my shelf.

“That’s my favorite kind of music,” Abe said. “I call it afternoon music. You don’t want to listen to it too early in the day, or the day’ll be lost to you.” Abe put his arms around Sadie. “You’re an

Edwidge Danticat story: “Shame is heavier than a hundred bags of salt.”

Easily, he slept; and as he slept, the woman in the photograph took her arm from the pastor’s waist, and crossed the parched lawn towards the camera. Her black skirts, thickly beaded at the hem, obscured the view of Bethesda; then her fine and muddied boots came over the frame, and were first set squarely on the table, then one by one on the floor:

This, the most widely distributed tree in North America with close kin on three continents, all at once feels unbearably rare. She

actuarial tables.

The tale calls our attention to traps and poisons we too easily take onto ourselves when we are caught in a famine of wild soul. Without a firm participation with the wild nature, a woman starves and falls into an obsession of “feel betters,” “leave me alones” and “love me—please.”