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	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 110 words of the full text and any section headings.

The sod is saturated here. The rivers
slide their cappuccino fingers
through the trees. Dead derelicts, scoured from their dens
bob softly seaward. Nothing interrupts
the lawn's flat plane.
How difficult must it have been
to leave a child, cold beneath the birches
on the east slope of this cemetery?

Almost twenty years. Still, I walk unerringly
to the grave of someone else's child. I scrape
dead leaves from the marker's face.
My fingers trace the dates, March 23, 1976
to November 29, 1979. The tracks of heavy trucks
have cut the slope just south of here.
A dozen tiny potholes mark their way.

E. M. McMahon, Jr
Seattle, Wash

Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2001;155:469.