I am interested, said Madeline, in people’s ability to live their lives
                                                      in fragments.

Two ex-husbands, three jobs in seven years, one daughter,
                                                      a geranium, and a certain TV show.

I used to think I’d reach a certain age, said Madeline,
and my heart would settle down, like a tired dog.

Yoga at the Y on Tuesdays;
then wild gusts of anger while driving home.

Reading an interview with Allan Bloom, she learns
that “the pursuit of happiness is a particularly America form of
                                                      nihilism.”

“Oh yeah, now you tell me,” she says.

“I can’t tell the difference between inner peace and mild depression,”
writes her friend from Philadelphia, in small blue script
on the back of a postcard of Chagall.

Dawn arrives on the horizon with its spreading rosy light.
Sometimes beauty serves as a kind of anesthetic.
The world provides evidence for almost anything.
Which would you prefer: a story or an explanation?

In the next two years, Madeline will have a love affair,
visit Bali and return, develop endometrial cancer,

and reconnect with her childhood Catholic faith,
worth more to her than anything.

Even at the bottom of the self, even in illness and despair;
in hubris, ecstasy and gloom.

the chick can be heard inside the shell,
pecking to get out, Pecking and pecking.