The Conversation Of Kisses. Subtle, Engrossing, Fearless,

Now I No Longer Believe That People's Secrets Are Defined And Communicable, Or Their Feelings Full-blown And Easy To Recognize.

She Sits In Her Usual Ample Armchair, With Piles Of Books And Unopened Magazines Around Her. She Sips Cautiously From The Mug Of Weak Herb Tea Which Is Now Her Substitute For Coffee. At One Time She Thought That She Could Not Live Without Coffee, But It Turned Out That It Is Really The Warm Large Mug She Wants In Her Hands, That Is The Aid To Thought Or Whatever It Is She Practices Through The Procession Of Hours, Or Of Days.

Because If She Let Go Of Her Grief Even For A Minute It Would Only Hit Her Harder When She Bumped Into It Again.

He Was Evidently The Sort Of Person Who Posed Questions That Were Traps For You To Fall Into.

I Would ... Go Up To The Mailbox And Sit In The Grass, Waiting. ... Till It Came To Me One Day There Were Women Doing This With Their Lives, All Over. There Were Women Just Waiting And Waiting By Mailboxes For One Letter Or Another. I Imagined Me Making This Journey Day After Day And Year After Year, And My Hair Starting To Go Gray, And I Thought, I Was Never Made To Go On Like That. ... If There Were Woman All Through Life Waiting, And Women Busy And Not Waiting, I Knew Which I Had To Be.