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She puts her basket beside her, squats, indelicately because no one is there to see and to judge if she is graceful. The leaf is beautiful, though she knows she wouldn’t be able to convince anyone of that. She smiles, glad she doesn’t need to convince anyone of anything about her and her own life. Not that Grandma won’t welcome her with love, as always. But she isn’t truly herself with anyone else and is certain she must be the only person like that. The leaf gathers to a point at the top and its edges curl in toward the center vein. If it were a map─the veins running out to the leaf’s edges could be rivers, and if she were a raven she could fly high enough so that the rivers could be seen like this, rivers far away and stretching further away. A small gust moves the leaf and it turns on its side, a sleeper shifting.
John Levy
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