play with them. She stood up and the bedspread slipped to the floor. She walked over to the closet and picked up a baby doll dressed in a red and white nightgown. Carie smoothed its golden hair. “Poor Missy, nobody loves you anymore.” She set the doll down and walked to the window again. The sun gilded the sky now and the clouds had disappeared. A slight breeze blew, and a leaf twirled to the ground The small twig shook slightly, but the cocoon clung and soon a butterfy would flutter from the covering. From the kitchen downstairs Carie heard a pan crash and a cupboard door bang. She stretched and pulled her hair on top of her head with the backs of her hands, then let it flop to her shoulders as her hands slapped down to her legs. It was good to hear the sounds of her family, but she lingered at the window for a while before going down stairs. She looked again at the cocoon. I hope I get to see the Butterfly, she thought. I wonder if he’ll be happy in this world? TIME CARRIES MEMORIES April evening showers; only music Prom the melody | hum. My shoes click on the wet pavement And squeak as | take one step after another. DESERT WIND Reflections of street lights rest The hard pushed wind from the red sand Whips through thorney cactus, And scatters sand in the wind funnels Of a thousand parched dust-devils. hills In puddles on my wau. | step, and reflections disappear; Ripples This arid simoom of the desert hills Harries the cracked mud pots In the shadowy bends of rainstorm creeks And holes of unearthed boulders. It scatters itself through compact valleys And piles of porous rock. Then rustles and moans through short wild grass And dies on the desert flats. Scot 10 the puddles back It blows through the desert a feathered cloud Which becomes the pillowy belly Of a large and mushroomed thunderhead That greys with ashen darkness. lt clouds the sun in a sheet of sand As it shifts the desert hills, And wears the brown leaves of a cottonwood From dried and brittle limbs. meet to bring again. Warm drops of rain sprinkle From the dark PD ampening the ground. Breezes carry the smell of wet dirt. taste the mudpies | made long ago. M argaret Duckmaster Hallowell 11