Bramah and the Beggar Boy
Page 18
if you ask me, what?
She cried out when they shaved her head then tarred
that egg-fragile skull, her body whipped.
In the end she smiled her cracked lips and spoke
Lock and Key, soon you’ll see
my body’s gone; my boy’s not dead.
Green and golden, never stolen
Bramah’s drill will always open—
Lament of the Stone Marker
Up by the Wishing Well, winnowing stone
dark engravings, drill driver, un/known.
Here might lie one Abigail Anderson
(adopted) daughter, 2050–2087
of Dr. A.E. Anderson, 2020–2057
Relinquished at the Gate
Whetstone, knife and sword,
scissor, shears, one plough,
a scythe, with several markings,
to be investigated.
One night, the one inside the other:
Raphael, sang-spoke his dying mother,
she of the Tabby and Twill.
Warp, to stand, she’d tell him
a warning, weft, to sleep,
side by side—Come oh Bramah
and save my child.
Consortium: in the hours after
Abigail as alabaster, stone cold.
Raphael long gone, howling in the arms
of those four aunties who fled to the farm.
At the Gate of the Unlucky
The Oracle of Gold and Green
Didn’t I tell them then,
portal to portal, winter, spring and fall,
by the ferry to the Island
round the campfire at midnight
candles left to burn, didn’t I call them, then
azure light, no real darkness and told them,
Come Midsummer’s Eve.
Didn’t I show them, then,
up at the farmhouse
high in the loft
messages sent
bird by bird: winter, spring and fall,
Beggar Boys with brooms, to sweep and to sing
Sword Girls to strike, sharp skilled, long limbed,
each marked to bring,
A. to meet B. and all the As after,
always an Aunt Agatha
and with her, Aunt Tabitha
at every birth, a story to say:
Us on the farm, us by the river
bring us the gold, keep green forever
were we to stand under moonlight so bright,
our faces shimmering, silver at night
right round our necks, three ribbons of red
never forget us, even when we’re dead.
Didn’t I tell them, then, didn’t I?
when the Tilt comes, all seasons will end.
Village Women Gossip
There’s our cousin Abigail lost in time.
She rode a white horse to a far field.
Men in the village cut out her tongue
they tarred and they feathered her coal-black hair.
Bald as an eagle she yet rides a white horse.
There’s our sister Ellen, always in prison.
She’s locked away in a mean little house
Whipped and silent as a dead mouse.
All her lives gathered and one day shot dead.
There’s our Aunty Agatha. Her broken heart.
All her men short a dollar, all of them late.
There’s our Aunty Tabitha. She’s real old,
Her husband died early; he took all her gold.
Who’ll ever tell that he fell down a well.
There’s our Aunty Magda, river to mud,
her husband did drown, he fell with a thud
blown to bits by bombs, embraced by the sea
whenever we’re asked, we say, Don’t look at me.
Out by the well, there’s a story to tell
there’s a gun rusted over, there’s roses and clover.
From womb to gate from Bramah to Fate—
One for the locket one for the key
One for the mountains and one for the sea.
Four Aunties at the Wishing Well
Said Aunty Agatha:
Oh was there ever a tale of more woe.
Said Aunty Tabitha:
Than this our Abigail and all her foes?
Said Aunty Magda, the River Dweller:
As ye reap then you’ll sow, elm to stone.
Said Aunty Maria, her beehives lost:
Find the skep, then you’ll find the long way home.
Said they all together:
We’ve washed you in the Wishing Well
From Abigail Ellen to Abigail
Born or adopted, we’ll never tell.
Said they all together:
Mother of the Forest, branched to be brave
They’ve stolen your acorns and we’re forlorn
Your roots still embrace us, still we are here—–—
Bring us steel scissors, bring us silken threads
They’ve stolen your acorns, soon they’ll be dead.
They looked up then, to see Bramah and a Beggar Boy——
Outside Perimeter, Faint Echoes Heard
A handful of children, pebbles in hand:
Abigail, Abigail, make no mistake
Faster and faster, you’ll end at the Gate——
Who was your mother, we’ll never tell
Who was your lover, some knew him well
Abigail, Abigail, shape-shifter, too
From Portal to Portal, you’ll always be true.
Right as rain
Good as new
Jumped the fence
You should too!
The Beggar Boy’s Song
As Written by an Itinerant Scribe
Pay me a Penny
I’ll sing you many:
Which oak box
This oak box
This Chalice
Is Without Malice
Right as Rain
Good as New
Jumped the Fence
You Should Too.
My mother named me.
Then she saved me.
Green and golden—–
Raphael.
A Note to the Reader
Thank you for entering the world of THOT J BAP. I thought you might like to know a little bit more about this world and why I created it.
I was born in India in the city once known as Poona, an old British hill station about eight hundred kilometres north of Mumbai/Bombay. At the age of six months, I arrived in Canada via Gander, Newfoundland and then trekked with my family across the continent, coast to coast. We moved from St. John’s up to St. Anthony, Labrador, then to Pictou County, Nova Scotia. From there we moved to Montreal, and then on to small-town Saskatchewan, finally settling down in the town of towns, New Westminster, British Columbia.
In grade school on the prairies and then in high school in British Columbia, I was, in those days, pretty much always the outsider, not really fitting in anywhere but eager to soak up the origin stories of other people, being rather embarrassed about my own: my father grew up a Hindu, my mother a Sunni Muslim, and they converted to Christianity. In fact, my father was one of the first South Asians ordained into the United Church of Canada as a graduate of McGill’s Faculty of Divinity. In those days, in this settler country, if you said, “United Church” you were as “Canadian” as Timothy Eaton or The Globe and Mail or even, if on the fringes, the NDP.
Everywhere we lived, I was asked, “What kind of Indian are you?” Once, when my parents were teachers up in the border country between northern Quebec and northern Ontario, I played with my friend Roxanne. She broke the news to me that no, I could not attend her potlatch. I cried later, telling my mothe
r who looked at me and said, “We’re not that kind of Indian.” She explained we didn’t have any right to Roxanne’s stories. I remember how quiet we both were, that faraway afternoon. We lived then in teachers’ housing on the edge of the bay.
Now, as I write to you this winter of our pandemic in the year 2020, I think on these memories and share them with a sense of gratitude: that, as an immigrant-settler-citizen, I’ve been allowed to live here on the lands of others, soaking up Story, alive to the way Place whispers layers of secrets, about time and those eternal questions:
Where are you from? Who are your people?
I’ve always seen myself on the outside of those questions, searching for the answers that perhaps will be found in this book you hold in your hands.
Maybe one day you will find yourself asked about your story, all the whys and wherefores. Maybe then you’ll think back on Bramah and her world, and when they ask you why—why portals, why gates, why rhymes?—you will heed the call of the four aunties of the Wishing Well. Maybe you will look around and see that cedar on the hill, rain running down its limbs, mist lowering the sky. And you will say to those who ask, Go stand there. Wait.
New Year’s Eve, 2020
Lives Lived in THOT J BAP: Book One
Name
Birth
Death
Age at Death
Dr. A.E. Anderson
2020
2057
37
Abigail
2050
2087
37
Bartholomew
2050
protected data
Raphael
2084
unknown
Aunty Agatha
1990
2130
140
Aunty Tabitha
1995
unknown
unknown
Aunty Maria
unknown
still alive
Aunty Magda
unknown
still alive
The Investigator
protected data
Guards of the Fifth Gate
unavailable
Beggar Boys
undocumented
Sword Girls
sworn to secrecy
Bramah is a demigoddess/locksmith, unaware of her origins.
Mythic characters found in the tales told by Bramah’s Grandmother:
Bloody-Eyed Jim, the Girl with a Thousand Pockets, Jai-Ishmael.
Throughout the world of THOT J BAP, we encounter a set of symbols that allude to the game of chess, to bio-contagion and viruses, to bees and to chemistry. Visit thotjbap.com, click on the key and use the code “2020” for more information about this epic.
Event Summary of THOT J BAP: Book One
Part One
In the far future, we meet Bramah, the locksmith summoned to do a job for Consortium. With Bramah is a Beggar Boy whom she befriends. Through a series of adventures they learn of an oak box at a farmhouse controlled by Consortium. Bramah is called to the farmhouse to unlock the oak box. She does this but also outwits the Guards and steals the box. Inside the box, Bramah and the Beggar Boy find many things, including an ancient parchment scroll. They read the scroll and the stories it contains of Aunty Maria, a Seed Saver who helps a group of outlawed scientists, including Dr. A.E. Anderson. We learn of the doctor’s connection to the Women of the Wishing Well, including Aunty Agatha.
Before Dr. Anderson is incarcerated by Consortium and made a prisoner of the Investigator, she helps a band of beggar children. She adopts one of them, a little girl, whom Aunty Agatha rescues, some say with the help of Bramah.
Part Two
This is the story of Abigail, the adopted daughter of Dr. A.E. Anderson, and takes place in the years 2057–2087. Abigail is brought up by Aunty Agatha who schools her in the healing arts and tells her stories of the Before-Time. Abigail journeys to the Great Cities of Transaction including Paris, Ahmedabad, Baghdad and finally chooses to heed her dead mother’s wish: she becomes a Portal traveller and joins the resisters in their quest to save seeds and battle Consortium. Abigail meets the scholar Bartholomew. They fall in love, conceive a child and are imprisoned. Abigail gives birth to their son, Raphael.
Chronology of Major Events in THOT J BAP: Book One
2020: the birth of Dr. A.E. Anderson during a bio-contagion.
2030–2050: a series of five eco-catastrophes leading to a world controlled by Consortium.
2050: the Battle of Kingsway.
2057: the worsening of planetary conditions that impact the lives of Abigail, adopted daughter of Dr. A.E. Anderson, and the Women of the Wishing Well.
2072: the Resisters continue to battle Consortium.
2087: the New Dark Ages.
The Far Future: where we first meet Bramah and the Beggar Boy.
A Note on Time Travel in THOT J BAP
In the world of THOT J BAP, time travel consists of observation only, like watching a hologram or a movie. Time travel is reserved for Certified Travellers, most of whom are on hire to Consortium, usually hunting down resisters. Bramah is a Certified Traveller and finds ways to subvert the terms of her contract to help others. Sometimes, Travellers will fall down Portals, by accident or due to evil forces.
About the Poetry
I was born in the time of floods: forehead,
anointed with honey, brown skin glistening.
My first memories of poetry are the sounds of my father’s gentle voice, English inflected with his mother tongue, Marathi, as he read me Mother Goose nursery rhymes. And later, the sound of my mother’s voice singing in the basement, a sweet lilting Gujarati, her first language. My parents brought my sister and I up in the English of what I sometimes think of as “middle Canadiana.” Not until 2010, as I worked on my first book and met the poet Marlene Nourbese Philip, did I develop a means to interrogate my “slipped tongue” and the pain-complexity of working in the only language I know, this conquistador, English.
Over the ten years I’ve spent working on this epic, THOT J BAP, I’ve been influenced by these reflections and hundreds of texts, including T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets and The Wasteland; Robin Blaser’s collected works, The Holy Forest; Rachel Blau DuPlessis’ Drafts; the poems and plays of Bertolt Brecht; and many editions of the work known as The Arabian Nights.
Add to these my lifelong companions Virgil, Dante, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, plus translations of Homer’s Odyssey, Wikipedia forays into Vedic scriptures, family gossip about Hindu gods, as well as rereadings of Christina Rossetti, Octavia Butler and an old red hymnal. Layered into all of that, readings of scientific reports on climate change and government malfeasance (CIA torture report) and many more documents, including the history of locksmithing, manuals on craft-making, old instruction books on inventions, out-of-date primers on astronomy, and even recordings of the late Robert Fisk as he spoke of world events in front of hundreds in a cathedral in downtown Vancouver.
And I’ve brought all of it into my obsession with formal poetry and with what I call docu-poetics, the breaking apart of text to create new forms, often in combination with visuals, such as symbols and signs. This obsession finds its creative tension in the investigation of the fragment fused into forms of poetry such as blank verse, the sonnet, the madrigal, the ballad, not to mention, spells, codes and riddles. You’ll find all these in THOT J BAP, plus new forms I’ve created and haven’t yet named!
So there I was, working away with all this, and then our pandemic happened. And this story grabbed my fingers and off we went deeper into that ultimate portal, myth and magic. The question is, will I ever return to Before?
Acknowledgements
An excerpt from the poem “The Summons” appears on a face mask designed by Debbie Westergaard Tuepah, commissioned by the Surrey Art Gallery, available for purchase spring 2021.
Earlier versions of selected poems appeared in chapbooks publis
hed by Nous-zot Press and above/ground press as well as in these literary journals: The Rusty Toque, Eleven Eleven, Tripwire and The Capilano Review. With gratitude to the late Marthe Reed and the late Peter Culley.
Iterations of THOT J BAP poems appeared in an outdoor eco-installation by the artist Chris Turnbull, photographs of which can be seen here: https://thecanadaproject.wordpress.com/what-is-thecanadaproject/thot-j-bap-collaboration-with-chris-turnbull/
Earlier iterations of selected poems from The Battle of Kingsway, a chapbook published by above/ground press in 2017 (bpNichol Chapbook Award finalist), were set to music by Owen Underhill of the Turning Point Ensemble. Special thanks to rob mclennan.
Earlier versions of selected poems are also found in the chapbook Extractions from THOT J BAP from Nomados Literary Publishers (2017), with thanks to Meredith Quartermain.