Hunger's Brides

by W. Paul Anderson

  So Ibis-head Thoth, script-lord, truth-scribe for the Ennead, called: Come out, semen of Seth! It called NOT from the mouth of Horus’s ANUS but from the marshes. Then Thoth put his hand on the shoulder of Seth, calling: Come out, semen of Horus! And the semen talked from Seth’s OWN bowels: Where shall I come out? Thoth replied: From his ear! But it answered: Am I to issue forth from an ear, when I am a divine jism? As a great Sun disk then it came from the top of Seth’s head. Thoth, the swifter, set the disk as a crown unsteady on his narrow-bird-head. Seth loud-shrieked-death-in-their-faces—reached to seize and tear the disk. But seeing the Ennead turning on Seth—swiftly I called: Another test! Let each contender build a stone boat to race against the other. But she-is-greatest-in-guile taught the half-dead to build a boat of balsam, coat it with gypsum, in appearance like stone. In the morning Seth’s stone boat went swiftly, straight to the bottom. So Seth became a hippo to sink the light swift boat! Horus drew back his copper barb, telling it—SLAY SETH! but the Ennead called out against this, Stop!

  And Horus stayed his cast. Horus spared Seth.

  Then Thoth prayed thee the All-Lord: Dictate a letter to Osiris, Lord of the Dead Lands, where he eats of gold and glaze—to choose between the contenders, who have been before the Tribunal now eighty years without a judgement. And did not His-heart-is-weary write back swiftly to the All-Lord of the Ennead?—causing thee insult, boasting of his accomplishments, of his gifts of barley and emmer and cattle to sustain the gods, without which all would swiftly starve, mocking the All-Lord’s invention of the Tribunal, as the begetting of Injustice as an accomplishment. And asking: did not all the stars of the gods have to set beneath his feet in the Western Lands?

  How Seth’s dead brother vaunted then over the Tribunal! asking who among the Nine was greater than he in strength, that his son should be cheated of his birthright. And did not Foremost-of-the-Westerners, lion who hunts for himself, threaten the HEARTS of the gods? saying:

  In the land where I am

  are savage-faced messengers

  who fear neither gods nor goddesses.

  I have but to unkennel these demons,

  and they will seek out the heart of any,

  and return it to me

  for the weighing.

  Craven, the Ennead said, the husband of Isis is right, the great-in-plenty and giver-of-sustenance is a million times right. But what need had Seth to fear the forty-two demons? Did not I know their names and have power over them? Seth-shrieked-death-loud-in-their-faces:

  O Being-of-fire walking backward—yea, I have stolen a god’s property! O Blood-drinker from the shambles—I have slain sacred cattle! O Bowel-eater from the Tribunal—I have extorted! O Pallid-one from On—I have prated! O Wrecker from Huy—I have trespassed! O Disturber from the sanctuary—I have wrought violence! O Accuser of Utjen—I have attacked and reviled a god! O Backward-facing from the pit—I have copulated with a boy! O Captor from the burial ground—I have cursed a god in my town….

  [——]

  [——]

  All these things Seth had done, but had he not been true to his own self, had he not been one with his ka? Seth’s front is pure! Seth’s rear is pure! Though others had lied and defied—though OTHERS had threatened and mocked the Ennead—yet the Nine found against Seth—even the All-Lord, who sent for Isis to bring Seth bound in shackles as her captive, in copper fetters to stand before thee. Why, thou askedst, does Seth evade the judgement of the Tribunal and defy it to take what belongs by right to Horus? But I answered thee—for is not Seth who-is-pleased-with-desertion and did I not then desert myself saying: No, not so, great Lord, All-Lord. I beg that Horus, son of Isis, pride of his uncle! be given the offices and titles of my dear brother, Osiris, his uncle.

  Bring Horus, son of Isis. And set the White Crown upon him.

  After eighty years.

  Horus was vindicated in the One-are-the-Two-Truths court, vindicated in the Pool-of-the-Field court, vindicated in the Horus-with-Projecting-Horns court. Hearing of the judgement, Seth’s followers took to the red desert in multitudes of rage—serpents, scorpions, crocodiles—the sky darkened. The Storm. But Horus was in possession of the Eye. It rose as a winged disk to rout the allies of Seth. Its wings were the breath of Kneph, its Ptah was the serpent’s eloquence, its disk, the all-source without beginning or end. The winged disk of Horus filled the ranks of Seth’s allies with madness, horror where it hovered over the battlefield. The allies of Seth were overthrown as by flame, turned back, driven out. Cutting and much slaughter were made of them, their names destroyed, their magics and their shadows stripped from them.

  And the lamentations of Seth’s followers filled the northern sky. And the lamentations of his ka filled the southern sky.

  Then in procession throughout Egypt was Seth driven before the young king, crying: Horus has purified himself in the Field of Rushes! Horus, son of Isis, has arisen as ruler, l.p.h.! Horus thou art the good King of Egypt, of both the Upper and the Lower, Lord of the Two Shores, of the Two Horizons, good lord of all lands, the Black and the Red, even of the foreigners-in-their-stinking, forever!

  Lo, the name of Seth reeks more than carrion, more than ducks smell. To whom am I to speak today?—brothers are unkind, the friends of today do not love. To whom shall Seth speak, when faces are blank and each turns his face from his brother’s? To whom shall the ka of Seth speak today, when the ba of Seth cannot open its mouth?

  To whom shall the ka of Seth speak today, whither shall I go now when I have been stripped of my seat in the dog star?

  You who come after, you who are to come in a million years, Death is to me now like myrrh on the air. Like a sick man’s healing. Like sitting beneath a sail spilling sweet wind. Like a bark beached on the shore of drunkenness. Like a sky, clearing. Death stands before me now like a mist lifted from a man’s eyes to reveal what has gone unseen. Death stands before Seth like his longing for home, and reaching it from War.

  There is One whose name I did not know, whose power Seth did not hold. He has crushed a million countries by himself. Before this name Seth is submitted. I am fallen on my side. Seth’s heart was weighed, the ba of Seth was found wanting. It is as if my name never existed, and my words, my seed never were, and my ka. And to Horus has been awarded the White Crown.

  Thou hast been vindicated against me. And if thou, O Horus, wouldst that Seth should die, his ka shall surely die.

  But lo! Horus has been taught to bind and unbind the knot Tyt, of Beginning and Restoration! Horus does not kill Seth! but leaves to him the place of honour foremost in the Bark-of-Millions! Truly he who stands before Seth will pilot the Sun-Bark between the two sycamores of Turquoise, where it sails high over the lake of Qeb. Jubilate through all the land! let there be jubilation throughout all Egypt for Horus, son of Isis! And for Seth. Seth jubilates with the Tribunal, Seth is strife-kept-within-walls, Seth is strength-against-Apophis. Apophis is smitten, turned back, its snout is split! In the Bark-of-the-Dawn-and-Sunset, Seth is sent to the foremost to spill the blood of Apophis through the twilights.

  For a million years.

  Seth is mother of the Eye, is made its bitch and has suckled it. The ka of Seth has sucked the thumb of Horus. Horus is in possession of the uninjured Eye, Horus is in his power-of-the-Eye-Restored.

  Horus, Falcon-of-Gold, is come from his egg, his wings are of greenstone. Child of She-who-wide-strides-the-sky, who sows stars from her seed-bag of greenstone, turquoise and malachite.

  Horus is Falcon-of-Silence who walks the path of mystery in lightland, child who speaks in silences with the Hidden One. The potency of Seth’s testicles fills the Eye of Horus. The potency of Horus grows silent in the bowels of Seth.

  My cry is in the silence of the child.

  My cry is in the silence of the child.

  My cry is in the silence of the child.

  Phaëthon BOOK SIX

  O you who enter the world and who leave it, God detests impudence.

  EMPEDOCLESr />
  And when you return, you shall have again been made a child.

  CODEX CHIMALPOPOCA1

  CONTENTS

  Tulum

  Muse War

  Obsidian Wine

  Sacred Harlot

  Saturday

  Bonfire

  Sunday

  Hope, long-lasting fever of men’s lives

  God’s War

  Bolder at other times

  Sacred Heart

  Last Dream

  Wizards

  Requiem

  Monday

  Green Axle

  Cenote Azul

  The Red Land, the Black

  Conquest

  The Far Shore

  Bright Child

  If men weighed the hazards of the sea

  Epilogue

  In recognition of the inimitable plumes of Europe

  TULUM

  TICKET TO ANYWHERE, Anytime Soon. First class yes—in this hell-heat what else. I board the bus, my silver-sided missile into the mysterious East. East across the Yucatán, peninsular swelter-states of steam called Tabasco, Campeche, Quintana Roo. Anywhere but here, the too-true state of Veracruz.

  Chill exhalate of reconditioned air … black vents mould encrusted. Tubercular incubations, beware. Avert eyes. Look up, out, ahead. Every curtain drawn against the sun, the devastation, the road-kill of poverty. All Mexico reduced to this long tunnel of white curtains. At the tunnel’s end a panel of sky blinding white, like a page of sun. Schoolbook bus-driver silhouetted in windshield. Mute flicker of television behind the silhouette head.

  An old woman in the next seat is watching me from the corner of her eye as she crochets. An offer of headphones drawn from her knitting bag. Si usted quiere, I’m getting too deaf for these. Lilac perfume. Steady needle clack.

  Diesel engine … gargle of pistons, breathless deathrattle that numbs and soothes.

  Sleep … I sleep like never in weeks, lulled on this diesel song, garble of throttle, long mantra of ommmm. And I can—sleep if not dream. At the next steambath, terminal city of Villahermosa, I go to the counter. Another ticket, please. To anywhere. The next leaving south, east. The ticketman squints at this, my dubious quest. Hurry, nevermind keep it keep it—

  All aboard the engine of rest.

  Through a night a day another night, at depot after depot straight to the counter I stagger drunken gambler buying more bright chips. Ya se lo dije, señor—anywhere south or east—what does it matter? on these buses I can sleep. And sooner or later the wheel stops on Tulum.

  Sleep-curtained screenings of silent shorts in Technicolor—Mexican slapstick, Hollywood drama. Jiminy Stewart crashed in the desert, a smash in an aviator’s jacket…. What state is this? Quintana Roo? Gracias. Is this the road to Palenque? No señorita it’s south of here. You’re not lost are you?

  Sleep, write, sleep. Wake every now and then to another traveller in the next seat. Disculpa, señor, are we near Tulum? No we are coming to the border with Belize. Tulum is north. You are not going to Belize?—you want me to tell the driver?

  No matter, no importa, me da igual.

  At the terminal a ticketseller hunched and squat says no—his head a fat brown orb socketed in necklessness. No more first class this afternoon. Tomorrow morning only, the Belize bus to Cancún. Ah Tulum … We have a very nice bus leaving in twenty minutes….

  All aboard this third-class rattletrap dipped in electric pink and green—gaudy parrot racket—cage without curtains or glass or screens. We barrel down the centre of our two-laned highway framed in low scrub and tall tree clumps. Foaming cascade of air, oblique riddling of light. Symphony of gears, gossip shouts, wind roar, furred howl of speakers of disembowelled cardboard—I sit, wide-eyed in this jetwash, more awake than in years. Señora, what is this music—salsa? No, CUMBIA, te gusta?

  Sí, sí … I like I like. Acoustical caffeine. Seventy dark bodies sway to the rhythm, the whole bus rocks side to side—hysteria on helium tires—cowbells, coronets, bright hectoring of wind and light, heady concussions of oncoming trucks plunging south….

  Bent figures in evening fields of corn and cane, glints of scythe, burros half-hidden under tottering stacks like stalkingblinds. Palm tops lit gold, glimmers of eastern sea between the trees … Over the sea a litmus strip of umber dipped in slate.

  Scabbed gaunt dogs / whippets of Sloth, slouch just clear of the giant shadow rush. Raw wounds scabbed in gorging flies that flinch and fluster in the last-instant hornblast. At every little town and crossing a grinding, screeching halt. Afterthoughts of dust catch up…. Child dervishes now, distilled from roaddust—sprite whirlwinds sprint to hawk bags of Coke and Fanta to go…. They hand up twist-tied baggies sprouting straws like potted palms.

  At a gas station, vendors tiptoe on gaspump islands and press hot elotes through the window gaps—tender white corncobs with chilli and mayo. The parrot bus coughs—pitches forward as though shot. Haste of coins dropped to upcast palms or pitched, and on down this highway that roars and rattles we shriek past cemeteries—death’s gaudy pantheons, mausoleums gay as carousels—right through front yards past lonely country shacks built to the road-side for company. House after house of unfinished second storeys, an endless spring of rebar sprouts … so many rusty hymns to optimism. On swayback porches, hammocks sag and gape their impassive freight of watchers.

  Streaked in dust, naked toddlers stalk wary hens.

  Elbow nudge. Toothless crone offers a stick of sugarcane—her own stick fiercely gummed and pulped. Defiant posterchild for tooth decay. Smooth black skin, whitewire hair, merry eyes, bright pink hippogrin. You chravel alone, fhar fhrum home? Where is your fhamily? Are you married?—no, thhhen soon? ¿tieneth nofhio, por lo menoth?

  Tropical nightfall’s sudden blackout—theatrical bomb—my stiff-kneed stumble down. Welcome to Chetumal.

  Warm coastal night … The blind lunge of a hundred thousand moths into floodlamps above the busbays. Strange mottling, freckled moth-shadow mosaic as through a crocheted lampshade, spun. The luxury bus in the next bay slides open its chilly window—Tulum, señorita? Cancún?

  Every last passenger is asleep. Severed arms, heads, splayed feet disembodied in the aisle. One seat left, second row, lucky me spared this gauntlet run of snore and loll and drool. My wide-awake eyes still awash in the day’s wind and light show….

  Bright morning. At last—Tulum of the pyramids on the sea!

  No pyramid. No sea.

  Along the highway a single scrawl of street under a white sift of flour dust. Strew of cinderblock cubes all missing their front, fourth wall. Two rows of open dollhouses, moviesets back to back, duel of musics across the dusty roadbed—west-side cumbia, reggae east.

  ¿Hamaca señorita, hamaca?

  This is really Tulum? Sí sí, with a hammock you sleep not here but on the beautiful beach a un kilometro. Free, no hotels. Restaurants by the sea, bars discotheques. Everything you need, water fruit mariscos—fresh fish very cheap. The best hamacas in all México, made by my sisters. Here take a Matrimonial for the price of a Doble. How many only one? If you are on the beach tomorrow I will show you how to be comfortable. With hammocks there is a secret.

  I limp down a whitedirt track through greygreen scrub. This heat, this airlessness. This bated breath, punctured arch. Limp on, ever on. Sun, seascent without sound … Ahead the shade of palms, a bend in the track—the sea. Lacquered tilt of a turquoise fan.

  Blinding smear of sand, snow-white hourglass dust, uncanny coolness underfoot. Walk out and down into this pale impossibility of blue. Far far out, waves of indigo turn fleece collars against a shear of reefs.

  Lean and strut of coconut palms prop puffs of cloud. An utter stillness seeps its white edges north, south … to each blank horizon. South through this still-life light I wade kneedeep into mindlessness. I wade past palm thatch parasols. Palapa huts. Under one or two a hammock droops … the chinstrap of a pith-helmet. Coolie hat.

  Please in this stillness let there b
e rest.

  [23 Jan. 1995]

  Sameness, stillness, rest. I will not write this … her death. Each day fetches kindling to the new routine’s cold ashes. Its flicker of pointlessness licks up as I get up hours before the dawn, walk the starlit strand north to Old Tulum.

  Slip past the gate, the sleeping guard, weave through the serpent columns up the steps of El Castillo, clifftop Maya watchtower to the East. Look down. A gloam rises from the ground. Take a narrow ledge-shuffle round to the eastern face, seven storeys of tower and cliff straight down to the sea. Sit. Wait. Think of nothing. Not sunrises over distant cities, not other countries, not old lovers. Watch for nothing.

  Slow turn of nothingness in its cage of stars.

  Suffer now the dawn’s blush deceptions, this sudden fetch of sun that kindles sea, kerosene reefs to molten gold. Glance left, north to the stone Temple of the Diving God—admire the brief illusion tricked in flame—the breakneck dive of stone into a shallow flood of fire. Look back now, west, back over precincts of old stone changed to rose … to dragon bones. Ruins charred on pure white light, to blackened blocks of chalky stone.

  The dawn fades, the shallows turn the blue of glaciers. A long shelf of aquamarine spreading south … a shore of ice in a pale tremble of blue, as if melting under moonlight. Slow return to sameness, day.

  In the distance the dapple of reefs, horseshoes of morning cloud stamped on sea….

  Insidious calm. Soundless sea I crave and dread. No wind. This breathlessness.

  Figures stir back at the gates. I stop to buy a ticket on the way down and out. The guard shrugs at the ticketseller. Return for sunset. Rewind. Repeat in reverse.

  [25 Jan. 95]

  Each afternoon one guide finds me at the top. The others all give up, turn away in disgust. His beautiful little smile, deep black eyes unfathomable. Dear, cotton shortpants of an immaculate confection, brilliant like the sand, little pedal pushers hemmed mid-calf. He wears a white cotton shirt, yoke embroidered red and gold and green. Red cottonbraid overshirt, belted jerkin.