Read the excerpt from chapter 8 of Obasan by Joy Kogawa."Who are the letters from?” I ask loudly.She does not respond. Her face is expressionless. After a while she puts down the magnifying glass."Everyone someday dies,” she says again.By repeating this so often, I suppose she is trying to make realizable what is real. Surely that is task enough for her today. But I ask once more, "Who are the letters from?”She stares steadily at the table. The greater my urgency to know, the thicker her silences have always been. No prodding will elicit clues.Her hand moves on the table like an electrocardiograph needle, delicate and unreadable. Then, with her back bent forward, she stands up and shuffles out of the room.Today is not, I repeat, reprimanding myself—today is not the day for unnecessary questions.