This gifted poet's memoir is the story of an inquisitive and sensitive young woman's coming of age and a deeply moving recounting of her reconciliation later in life with the family she left behind. Hers is the story of a mother proud to be a Lady, a Southerner, and a Christian; of two daughters trapped by their mother's power; and of their father's breakdown under social and family expectations. Slow to rebel, young Margaret finally flees the world of manners and custom--which she deems poor substitutes for right thought and right action in the face of the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War--and abandons her fundamentalist upbringing. After years of being the distant, absent daughter, she finds herself returning home to meet the needs of her stroke-crippled younger sister and her incapacitated parents.