Orphan Train

by Christina Baker Kline

Maybe the value is in the process—in touching each item, in naming and identifying, in acknowledging the significance of a cardigan, a pair of children’s boots.

people who matter in our lives stay with us, haunting our most ordinary moments. They’re with us in the grocery store, as we turn a corner, chat with a friend. They rise up through the pavement; we absorb them through our soles.

just beyond the rage is a sorrow so enervating it could render her immobile.

It is marvelous to be young on a big-city street.

We cling to each other like survivors of a shipwreck, astonished that neither of us drowned.