THE WARTIME ISSUE Bill Vander Clute   LESS THAN A MOMENT  She wants the world cold             but this is Texas                         in summer brown, hot blue. She wants the men in suits             to have faces but                         their sunglasses are the eyes of movie aliens. The movies. What was the one they saw? She can almost see it again, now. And what was the air like that night? What people did they pass? Strangers now the only link to something so ephemeral there is no shimmer, no wavering band of light. This was not the way the world was supposed to look today. She wants the infant             in the bath, the                         squeals, splashes smiles in the small room. She wants a chance             to say things she                         doesn’t want to say.     Bill Vander Clute received a Vermont Council on the Arts grant for fiction. He teaches English and drama and is active in local community theater.   Published in Volume 7, Number 2, Spring 2006.