Emily grabbed his sleeve. “No, Walt, don’t! We don’t know what manner of creature he is—”
With a note of gentle reprimand, Walt answered, “If I wish to speak to anyone I see, who shall say me no?”
Emily reluctantly released his sleeve, and Walt closed the distance between himself and the boy in a few decisive steps.
Squatting down beside the child, Walt said, “Son, can you hear and understand me?”
The child’s voice was sweet as clover. “Yes.”
“Where are you? What has happened to you?”
The child blinked, its green lashes sweeping over green eyes. “I—I was old. Sick. Dying. I—I died.”
Emily drew breath sharpened like a stake. So it was true. They were in Summerland, the anteroom to Paradise. . . . Old religious tremblings overtook her.
“What year did you die?” queried Walt.
“Year? Oh, you speak of time. The year was nineteen—nineteen ninety something—I can’t remember.”
Now Crookes found his tongue. “This is preposterous! How can we be talking to the spirit of someone who hasn’t even lived yet?”
“Time is not a simple matter,” Davis warned. “It is quite conceivable that Summerland is coexistent with all ages, past, present and future. Such a theory would explain the precognition exhibited by certain spirits. . . .”
“What was your mortal name?” asked Walt.
“Name?” said the child, as if it were the most foreign of words. “I think I had a name. It’s all fading so fast. Allen. Allen Ginsberg. Is that a name?”
Walt laughed at the sound of the mundane syllables amid so much strangeness, and clapped a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Indeed it is, and a fine Hebraic one at that.”
At Walt’s touch, a look of amazement transfigured the child’s features. “You’re Walt Whitman!” he said. Then, as if overcome by the knowledge, the boy swooned away.
Alarmed, Walt quickly scooped the child up in his arms and stood.
Where the boy had been born, the prairie was clean of grass in a neat outline of his form, revealing the fecund brown earth below.
But even as they watched, new grass thrust its spears up through the soil, stopping its accelerated growth when it was level with its cousins. Soon, nothing distinguished the spot.
Walt carried the boy into the circle of tents and sat him down with his back against a bundle of equipment. Unstoppering a bottle of water, he sprinkled some into the face of the child.
Allen—for so Emily now found herself thinking of the child—opened his eyes.
“The sea,” said the boy. “I must find the sea and join the others in it. . . .”
Allen got to his feet and began to walk toward the setting sun.
“Wait!” exclaimed Davis.
Allen obediently halted, his small unclothed form yet seeming to strain west.
“Is this the Tourmaline Sea you speak of?”
“It has no name. It is simply the sea. And I must go to it.”
Austin reached out a hand toward the child, as if he wished to cradle him. “You seem to have gained knowledge of this land somehow, Allen. Can you help us find our loved ones here?”
“If they have reached the sea already, you seek them in vain. And why do you call me Allen?’”
“But—you told us that was your name before you arrived here—”
The boy regarded them with utterly ingenuous frankness. “I was never anywhere but here, forever. I know only Summerland.”
12
“HOW ODD THE GIRL’S LIFE LOOKS BEHIND THIS SOFT ECLIPSE”
A FIRE WOULD have been pleasant. A fire would have kept away the fear. A fire would have dispelled the gloom.
A cheerful blaze it would have been, as on a winter’s night in The Homestead, when the entire Dickinson family would gather for a Bible reading, the three children still young, the Squire relaxed, Emily’s mother less indisposed than nowadays. Perhaps it would even have been one of those rare occasions when Emily had been invited to climb into her father’s lap, where he sat in his massive chair beneath that engraving of “The Forester’s Family,” a happy brood so unlike her own. And perhaps the Squire would have unbent enough actually to cosset his daughter, pet her hair and tell her she was a good girl, despite her being such a disappointment, too simple at age ten even to read a clock. . . .
But there was nothing to burn here in Summerland, lest it be their own equipage.
And if there had been, would they have dared to start a fire that would inevitably scorch and damage this miraculous grass, an entity apparently capable of giving birth?
And would the grass have even let them?
So the disconsolate travelers were forced to sit in a circle around the wan glow of a single whale-oil lamp—much diminished by the glory of the polychrome sky—discussing their next “day’s” moves in the light of recent events, prior to turning in.
Outside the range of the light, the huddled ostriches muttered petulantly, as if their dim brains were finally registering the abnormality of their surroundings.
Beyond the birds, Allen stood.
The strange, inscrutable child faced west, his long unchanging shadow reaching almost into the camp. Still as a jade statue, he appeared to be communing with someone or something the humans could not perceive. He had maintained this immobility for an hour, and seemed intent on continuing so for many more.
After confounding them with his response to Austin, the boy had made as if to leave.
“Please,” pleaded Crookes at the last minute, “you must stay and help us.”
“I will if he wants me to,” said Allen.
And the green child pointed to Walt.
“It amazes me how he has fixed on you,” said Crookes.
“It happened when we touched,” said Walt. “There was a flow of intelligence between us. I daresay it would have happened with anyone else as well.” Addressing the child solemnly, Walt said, “It would gladden my heart to hear your valved voice a while longer yet, my son.”
“Then I will stay,” said Allen.
It had seemed a major victory at the time.
But now their talk revealed how far from solving their problems they were.
Nervously twirling a bit of string around a finger, Crookes said, “Assuming Allen can help us reach the shore of this nameless sea, what do we gain? The Thanatopsis will be many miles away, so we will not be able to set sail—even if such a course should seem worthwhile. Granted, we might meet these other resurrectees, if Allen is to be believed. But if they are all as naive as he—”
“Maybe,” said Austin, “there will be elders among them who will be able to help us. . . .”
“What disappoints me most,” said Davis, “is that the dead apparently forget everything about their earthly lives. And I was so looking forward to discoursing with Alexander the Great. . . .”
“And I with my children,” Austin echoed.
“Bah!” spat Madame Selavy. “This enfant vert is not one of the real spirits! He is some kind of unhuman devil, bent on leading us astray! Why, imagine—he did not even react when I mentioned Princess Pink Cloud! No, you may rest assured that I will know the true ghosts when we meet them. Have I not spoken with them for years?”
Crookes threw down his bit of twine and stood. “Well, this talk is getting us nowhere. Let us retire, and perhaps things will look brighter in the morning.’”
They all betook themselves to their assigned tents.
Beneath the lowering canvas assigned to the ladies, Madame Selavy moved quickly to establish her dominance.
“I will not put up with any snortling or fidgeting, Mam’selle. Watch your elbows, occupy only your half of the tent, do not snatch the blankets, and we will get along fine.”
So saying, Madame Selavy flopped down on their rude pallet, arrayed herse
lf grandly in three-quarters of the coverings, and, shifting onto her side so that her hams overhung Emily’s portion of the mattress, began within thirty seconds to manufacture a mustache-fluttering snore.
Squeezing herself into the remaining space and trying to keep as much room between herself and the pungent seeress as possible, Emily lay sleepless on her back.
Neither she nor Walt had had much to say during the discussion just past. The miracle of Allen’s birth seemed to preclude ratiocination. Emily knew that the true meaning of the manifestation could only be apprehended poetically, and she longed to hear what glorious thickets of verbiage Walt might have effused from the miracle. . . .
After half an hour of such ruminations, Emily stealthily rose, and left the tent.
No one else stirred within the encampment, where the lamp still burned untended.
Emily approached Walt’s tent. Timidly, she lifted a flap.
Young Sutton slept alone, his cherubic face peaceful.
Dropping the flap, Emily moved beyond the bivouac’s fitful flame.
She found Walt sitting cross-legged beside Allen. The poet was as mesmerized as he had been aboard the Thanatopsis, when he had first heard the grass speak.
Gingerly, Emily touched his shoulder.
Walt started, then turned his face upward.
“Emily,” he said, in the tones of one recognizing a childhood friend not seen for decades. “’Tis vigil strange I keep here this night. I am glad for human company. Come—sit here beside me.”
Awkwardly, Emily folded her legs beneath her skirts and sank down to the velvety turf.
Allen paid no attention to the actions of the humans, but continued to stare off in the direction of the ever-setting sun.
Walt took one of Emily’s hands in his. Her pulse raced like spring torrents.
“I am at peace now with my father,” said the man, “even though I have seen not seen his soul clothed in human form, as I foolishly longed to. I have realized what I always knew, but had forgotten. My father is all around me, in the mossy scabs of the worn fences, in the heap’d stones, in the elder, mullein and poke-weed. I need search no further.”
Emily felt ecstatic tears scald her cheeks. “Oh, Walt, I’m so happy for you.”
Walt transferred his hands to her waist. “Let me share my renewed joy and strength with you, Emily.”
And then he kissed her.
George Gould had kissed her once. But that was years ago. And he had been a smooth-faced youth, not a virile bearded man!
Walt broke away and whispered, “You villain touch! What are you doing? My breath is tight in its throat! Unclench your floodgates! You are too much for me. My sentries have deserted their posts. . . .”
“Mine also, . . .” said Emily.
And she drew him down with her onto the lawn.
Walt’s hands were busy beneath her clothing. “Urge and urge and urge, always the procreant urge of the world. Out of the dimness, opposite equals advance. Always substance and increase, always sex. Always a knit of identity, always a breed of life. Learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so. To elaborate is no avail—”
“Don’t, then!” hissed Emily.
Walt was atop her now, his face buried in her neck, his weight like a treetrunk splaying her legs. She smelled the scented herbage of his breast.
Emily clutched him tight, her mouth against his ear. “My river runs to thee, blue sea! Wilt welcome me? My river waits reply, oh sea—look graciously. I’ll fetch thee brooks from spotted nooks. Say, sea—take me!”
Walt said, “Ma femme—” then pressed with slow rude muscle against her.
Emily cried, and bit her lip.
In the sky, a cloud bled alizarin.
Walt was moving slowly. “Ebb stung by the flow, and flow stung by the ebb. Love-flesh swelling and deliciously aching. Limitless limpid jets of love, hot and enormous. Quivering jelly of love, white-blow and delirious juice. Bridegroom night of love working surely and softly into the prostrate dawn, undulating into the willing and yielding day. I am lost in the cleave of the clasping and sweet-flesh’d day!”
“Yes, Walt—I am the day, and you are my night!”
“And now comes the dawn!”
Walt howled a barbaric yawp, and sagged onto her, eclipsing the sky.
Emily didn’t see how the others could have failed to hear Walt’s climax. Surely they would be venturing out to see what the commotion was. But she made no move to escape Walt’s embrace. She was not scared of their censure, here on the edge of dying in this strange land. Let everyone see what a royal hoyden she was!
Title divine is mine! The Wife without the sign!
Twisting her head slightly, Emily realized that her limited field of vision included the small feet of the green child. Upon resolving them, she had the strangest feeling that he was the improbable son of their just consummated union.
She waited for the others. But they never came.
Enchanted or exhausted, they had slept through Emily’s coronation.
Finally, Walt stirred and removed his bulk from atop her.
“We should return, Emily, before we worry the others.”
“Whatever you say, Walt.”
As they walked back toward their separate tents, Emily felt a little sad and worried and tired, her exaltation fading.
“Walt?”
“Yes?”
“Did the Harebell loose her girdle to the lover Bee, would the Bee the Harebell hallow much as formerly?”
“I am for you, and you are for me, Emily. Not only for our own sake, but for other’s sakes. You awoke to no touch but mine.”
“Oh, Walt!”
13
“THERE WAS A LITTLE FIGURE PLUMP FOR EVERY LITTLE KNOLL”
WHEN EMILY AWOKE, this was how she felt.
If all the griefs I am to have
Would only come today,
I am so happy I believe
They’d laugh and run away!
Lost in an eerie borderland between life and death with no prospect of rescue, she should have felt as miserable as her unlucky companions.
But Walt’s attentions and embrace had allowed her to transcend her immediate condition.
At last she had captured her soul-mate, forging with him those immemorial carnal bonds which time could never snap. And what a catch! A tender yet rugged male deep enough to match her female needs, a wild poet with roots in the hidden wisdom of the universe.
Finally, Emily knew how her esteemed Elizabeth Barrett had felt when she had found her Robert. At that moment, Emily realized she had been secretly rather jealous of “the Portuguese” all these years.
Now she could easily let such juvenile emotions go.
As she stretched luxuriously in the otherwise empty tent, her long chestnut tresses undone and in rare disarray, Emily praised Walt for doing so much for her. She swore she would do as much for him. Whatever he wanted or needed, wherever he roamed, whatever he did, she would stand by him, as support and inspiration.
Great I’ll be, or Small—or any size at all—as long as I’m the size that suits Thee!
Suddenly Emily could wait no longer to see her beloved. Hurriedly, she left the tent.
The others were sitting around the extinguished lamp, partaking of a light breakfast.
Walt loafed on the grass, one arm resting on a bedroll, legs extended. His gaze was fixed on a single plucked blade held between thumb and forefinger.
“Ah, Miss Dickinson,” called out Crookes, “we thought you had sneaked into the ether, so soundly did you sleep! But you have awakened just in time, as we’re about to break camp. Walt, perhaps you’ll tell Miss Dickinson what you’ve learned.”
Now Walt looked up at Emily. His face betrayed none of what had passed between them last night, showing only his general benevole
nt and sunny impartiality, somewhat tempered by the stresses of their situation.
What a considerate lover, thought Emily. He seeks to hide our relationship and spare me any possible embarrassment. I will have to tell him in private that there is no such need. I would shout my love from the rooftops of Amherst . . .
Walt discarded the grass. “I have been speaking with Allen. During the ‘night,’ he learned more of what he has to do. He must find six of his peers to accompany him to the sea. Only as a unit will he and the others be able to achieve their destiny, and move on to the next plane of existence.”
“It makes excellent sense,” said Davis. “Seven is the mystic number supreme. Seven planets, seven days, seven metals and seven colors—As the properties of seven are powerful on earth, so must they be in Summerland.”
“In this sense, then,” Crookes extrapolated, “our own expeditionary force was incomplete and unbalanced until the late fortuitous addition of Miss Dickinson.”
Madame Selavy hurriedly disposed of a pickled egg so that she could declaim, “I myself would have preferred to be un peu discomboobled, rather than have along such an unsympathetic intellect.”
Even Madame could not fluster Emily this morning. She bestowed a gracious smile on the seeress and directed her words toward Crookes.
“I would not have missed this outing for the world, Professor.”
Now Austin spoke up gloomily. “Unless Allen and his compatriots can help us get home, dear sister, that exchange might be precisely what we’ve bartered.”
On this note of urgency, and without further delay, the exiles assembled their gear and were on their way, led today by the preternaturally obsessed and silent Allen, Walt in second place.
Somehow, Crookes had ended up with the reins of Emily’s mount, while Austin had taken a string of pack-ostriches. Finding themselves somewhat apart from the others, the Professor now engaged Emily in conversation.
“It seems to me that if we can project our first day’s experiences with any justification, then we should witness the rebirth of a new soul out of the grass every twenty-four hours or so. Reckoning thus, it should take approximately a week to assemble the company required by Allen. I believe our supplies will stretch that far, with just a little caution. Though much beyond that point, I cannot hold out hope.”
The Steampunk Trilogy Page 28