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  Lungs are supposed to be big, full, and healthy not as dry and shriveled as mine felt as we steadily plowed along. Of course, I have never seen a lung but I seem to remember the air being easier to breath. And while I have never pursued being a doctor, I know that lungs should not have to filter the amount of dust and grime that my unfortunate pair struggle with daily. 

  My fingers come back from endeavoring in another stray adventure through the knotted forest of my dirt brown hair and on top of the permanent stain there lays another layer of grit. My skin used to be a simple pale-white, the color our people are meant to be. But now we all resemble a group of Indians, riding through the wilderness tanned by the sun and the earth. Except we live in tattered white people clothes and our hair still has its native lack of pigmentation. 

  I don't remember how many hot days and cold nights I have spent isolated from others besides our wagon train. I know it's far too many. I have grown accustomed to our wild friends. I recognize animals we have no name for. I imagine they are thinking the same about us as we observe each other from between distances separated by expanses of rocks, ravines, inclines, and even small mountains. Stars are my midnight companions who fill my head in the absence of dreams. They drape a sparkling blanket over top of our camp, covering our now thin, bony, bodies. 

   The leaders of our wagon train tell us that we will encounter people soon. But after eating the same words for weeks, we all realize that they will never fill our empty stomachs. Repetition only reminds us of our hunger. For many, the fabled flame of hope is now just an empty, charred pit that swallows our hungry souls. I wake up each mourning and scan for the ever growing blackness that is conquering our people. We are dirt on the outside and empty pits on the inside. But yet we keep moving, because people without motivation continue to wander. To stop, we would need a reason. Reasons use lots of light and heat to send up with the sparks. Black pits do not have light, heat, or sparks. Therefore, we walk. 

  Lee-Roy Ferrston left her home in Georgia about a year ago. She had a family, half left with her while half waved goodbye. Lee-Roy held her younger brother's hand as they boarded their wagon for the first time. Her uncle lifted her up and over the wooden steps. Lee-Roy's mother fluttered her hand as the fresh horse pulled them away from Lee-Roy's home. Her father smiled and nodded in encouragement. They told Lee-Roy and William, her young brother, that they would follow them to the west coast after her mother gave birth to Lee-Roy's upcoming sibling. Till they could meet by the Pacific, Lee-Roy and William were to travel with her fathers brother, Uncle Sawyer. Lee-Roy lifted her simple, pale-white hand and waved goodbye in response to the flutter and smile, flames flashed across her fingers. 

  The girl in the battered wagon with a sickly horse dressed in pieces of her clothes that her mother had sewn for her, lifted her skeleton of a hand. The girl with grit highlighting her tangles and skin tanned by the unforgiving earth used her day's reserve of energy to twitch her fingers. Fingers that once burned so brightly, now sprinkled black fragments in their wake.