I See A Green Tree. And To

Listen,” F. Jasmine Said. “what I’ve Been Trying To Say Is This. Doesn’t It Strike You As Strange That I Am I, And You Are You? I Am F. Jasmine Addams. And You Are Berenice Sadie Brown. And We Can Look At Each Other, And Touch Each Other, And Stay Together Year In And Year Out In The Same Room. Yet Always I Am I, And You Are You. And I Can’t Ever Be Anything Else But Me, And You Can Ever Be Anything Else But You. Have You Ever Thought Of That? And Does It Seem To You Strange?

It Is A Curious Emotion, This Certain Homesickness I Have In Mind. With Americans, It Is A National Trait, As Native To Us As The Roller-coaster Or The Jukebox. It Is No Simple Longing For The Home Town Or Country Of Our Birth. The Emotion Is Janus-faced: We Are Torn Between A Nostalgia For The Familiar And An Urge For The Foreign And Strange. As Often As Not, We Are Homesick Most For The Places We Have Never Known.

She Wished There Was Some Place Where She Could Go To Hum It Out Loud. Some Kind Of Music Was Too Private To Sing In A House Cram Fall Of People. It Was Funny, Too, How Lonesome A Person Could Be In A Crowded House.

But The Hearts Of Small Children Are Delicate Organs. A Cruel Beginning In This World Can Twist Them Into Curious Shapes.

It Was Like They Waited To Tell Each Other Things That Had Never Been Told Before. What She Had To Say Was Terrible And Afraid. But What He Would Tell Her Was So True That It Would Make Everything All Right. Maybe It Was A Thing That Could Not Be Spoken With Words Or Writing. Maybe He Would Have To Let Her Understand This In A Different Way. That Was The Feeling She Had With Him.