Cities hold their shape as they recede. Into mist or distance—I lose them looking from the train. What is enclosed in each house glimpsed through the halls of trees? Where are the families, if not in the junked yards, the woods by the tracks? Suddenly, the clear horn sounding. I sit, watch my passage over a country of stolen children. A policy of family separation is considered an effective deterrent to entry. From here the damaged world looks half abandoned, or abandoned whole. Please don’t go, don’t leave me. Or, Don’t take her. The system is coordinated; each person in the line does his part. From the tracks, it’s easy not to see the shacks or clumps of tents. We are not responsible for what happens once we hand them off to ICE, said the spokesperson on the radio. Ghost towns rise and vanish. The woman across the aisle rubs noses with her baby, who sways, burbling, on her lap. She blows raspberries. The late sun shifts. Train conductors, I learned, are advised to look away from suicides. The train’s momentum cannot be overcome in time, even if you pull every lever. One conductor recalled watching a man walk toward him, down the very center of the track, staring into his face through the glass. Now the sun flares against the window, and briefly the woods are translucent, breaking. Passing through a town, a young boy tries to keep up on his bicycle. We watch each other as his mouth makes the shape of laughing, and he waves madly, standing up, pumping hard on the pedals, before falling away again.