A Table of Green Fields

by Guy Davenport

  We talked about everything that came into our heads. I heard about the university and lectures. I learned the nature of girls. He explained socialism and free love among his student friends. I kept saying O and why. I undid a button of his fly and he undid a button of mine while we talked. He was surprised that I had not read the Iliad. It was the book he had brought. He would show me how to read it if I wanted to. He undid the next button. I countered.

  A mist stretched spooky and white from bush to bush and smoked along the ground. We put more sticks on the fire and by its light we squared our quarters away and undressed. I snuggled in while Florent banked the fire with dirt. He sat crosslegged beside me on the bedroll. We heard owls as we went to sleep and unknown animals treading without caution on their rounds. The white river crashed cold over its rocks.

  We were stiff from the ungivingness of our bed and stretched gratefully and naked in the pale morning warmth. We splashed clean in the dashing river and dried on the rocks with tin mugs of coffee to sip. I wanted to stay naked but Florent said that could wait until we were days further up the peninsula.

  We climbed a great deal of the morning but crossed level highlands deep in strange and enormous ferns all afternoon. We saw hares and deer and the dead kingdoms of the beavers.

  There was no river at our second station. We had dried beef in gravy made from an essence that came in cubes. We'd gathered wild plums yellow and tasty which we ate for dessert.

  We'd cleaned and stashed our supper ware when Florent made himself comfortable with a rucksack under his shoulders. He had his pipe handy but did not light it. There was mischief in his eyes. His hand with fingers shoved between the buttons of his fly interested me greatly. Because of the sweetness of his smile I came to sit on his thighs and play the monkey with his fingers and buttons. His eyes said yes. He wrecked my hair and remarked on how the evening came on as much from below in green and blue darkenings among the trees as in a softening of departing light above. He put his hands on my legs and slid them up to my tummy and around my waist. I had unbuttoned him and made a clumsy disarrangement of everything. He pulled me to his shoulder with his cheek against my hipbone and with a heave and wiggle and two kicks got his trousers and underpants off and lowered me back to where I was. I had listened carefully over the past days to his saying that the Greek god Eros was a boy my age.

  He taught me names. The head of the peter is the Latin for acorn. Its rim is the Latin for crown. Its bag with the twin eggs is the scrotum. That the sleeve is the prepuce or as the Latin translates the foreskin I knew from Scripture.

  He explained while my heart was thumping at a gallop how the foreskin is like an eyelid. It too was a sensitive soft moving protector of a surface wonderfully tender. The two are where the flesh engages the spirit in its most sensual experiences.

  There are our sensors of heat and cold and of textures in the world. Of sound and smell and taste. But the eye is the world. The eye and the glans or acorn are curiously alike and different. The eye is open to light. The glans is hidden except of course among lovers and frank honest people of good will. And friends.

  They are like Swedenborg's heaven and hell. The healthy eye is cool and bright. The glans as you can feel is warm as blood and as dark as the inside of the body.

  My mouth was as dry as the day Tarpy and I played with ourselves. Florent said in his friendliest way that if the god Eros was with us here in the dark deep of a Swedish forest and the nays of the world many miles away we would know it both by his famous cunning and his shameless boldness. Did he play with himself like a boy?

  Lots. It is nature and good for the spirit. But only if Eros is running the show. Were we friends? I am if you are.

  We put our foreheads and noses together and laughed. He took off my breeches. Tarpy's big business was a parsnip compared to Florent's.

  I had squeezed and pulled and caressed and he had replied in kind. Eros was happily busy and inventive.

  But as things got more wonderful Florent disentangled us and whistled cheerfully while he poked up the fire and put our coffee pot on to heat. I was dancing with impatience. This got me laughed at and a hug. He said we would learn to play with each other well. We would both teach the other. So we had our coffee as the dark came on. I would have liked it better if I hadn't been half out of my mind. Maybe wholly out of my mind. The second time was longer and sweeter. Florent said we were still initiates in the rites of Eros who needed to know if we were of his ilk before his magic eyes and fingers did what they do best.

  The wilderness was grander day by day. The forest darker. The rocks greyer and sharper. The streams whiter and swifter. Florent taught me the Greek alphabet on our marches and I would recite it first thing every morning. He began to tell me the Iliad. It had all happened three thousand years ago. He told me about Schliemann and Hissarlik.

  On a wide shale beach under a cliff shelved with ferns and topped with larches that went up to the sky we pitched our tent and jacked each other off for the first time in broad daylight. In spite of breaking them in my boots had made a blister on my left big toe and heel. Florent said we would give them a chance to get well. I held my foot in the cold dashing water of the stream. Florent fished above the shoals. We did our wash and laid our shirts and breeches on the clean shale to dry. Our underpants and stockings hung on the tent ropes.

  Florent put a blanket in the sun and painted my blisters with iodine. I yowled. He slid his hands along my legs and rolled my balls against my crotch. He lay on his elbows and lazily worked a good feeling into my peter with his fingers. For mischief he tickled around the eyelet with his tongue. I straddled his tummy when it was time and jacked him from the front while he kept an idling hand on my peter. The second time we lay head to hip and did it together and decided that getting and giving at the same time was sort of crowded and too much of a good thing. His spunk on the tip of my finger tasted like soda and green grass. He licked some puddled in my belly button and agreed.

  We explored the woods naked. We found long humps of moss that was like a deep carpet to walk over. Pitcher plants. A lady slipper all by itself. A mouse's round nest in saw grass. Snow hawks wheeling overhead. Knee-deep in a clearing of daisies and quitch grass we stood nose to nose and peter to peter. On my toes. It was a pledge.

  We played leapfrog and Florent told more of the Iliad. We cooked our fish and oat cakes and stewed dried apples. Ruckled sooty clouds filled the sky by sunset. We got our clothes in and trenched around the tent and floored it with our rosined tarpaulin. The rain came with a whomp. I was never snugger. We sat and watched the windy warp of the downpour from the front of the tent. Our arms around each other's shoulders. While Florent sat with his knees up and smoked his pipe I lay in front of him and fiddled with his peter. I fingered and studied the conic obliquity of its nozzle. Its sumptuous vascularity. The gutty crimple of the balls. It crested as I meddled and spanged proud in my hand. I worked it into tone. You can tell by Florent's eyes and the polish of the stud. And by his saying so. I tried a boldness. I flicked my tongue against the little link of flesh that checks the underslide of the foreskin. The frenum. He liked it. He wiggled his toes and flossed my hair. He called me goose and rascal. I tongued the full contour of the glans and swivelled my lips on the flare. He throbbed and gushed. He flinched and shoved my head back. I panicked. I think he panicked. He swore. A flaw of wind worried the tent flaps. The rain slapped down in torrents.

  I asked what the matter was. He didn't answer. There was just enough light to see him huddled. Biting his lip. He said Jens. Not goose. Or chief. But Jens. We sat in the dark for the longest.

  Finally he scrounged in the rucksack and got something out. And something else. A candle. The tinder box. He lit the candle and set it in a tin cup between us. The rain was chilly and we put on our shirts.

  He smiled at me. I think some tears had run down my cheek more from confusion than anything to cry about. Their salt mixed with the alkaline taste in my mouth. He stuffed his pipe wit
h the cidery tobacco and lit it with the candle. I asked for a puff. I filled my mouth with the sweet smoke. My stomach listed crazily as I blew it out but I gave no sign. It was Florent too.

  How the rain came down! He said he thought we had gone too far. Was it wrong? It was wrong in that a game which we played casually for the lust of the flesh might become a bond which we could only break along with our hearts. You have already had your heart broken.

  With Tarpy.

  He would have to go away in less than a month. I said I thought I understood. I wasn't sure. He mentioned the world. Its disapproval. And added that for the moment the world around us was but rain. Lovely rain. Cozy rain.

  I had another mouthful of pipe smoke and felt as weightless as a flaught of goose down. Florent made himself comfortable with his head on the shins of my crossed legs. I told him about Tarpy. Why I made friends with him. How I cleaned him up and gave him clothes. Florent said he knew. Papa told him.

  Did he know who sent Tarpy away? He didn't know. He was sure it wasn't Papa. Who Florent said knew about our jacking off and thought it only natural. Florent said he was even mildly amused. But he had been told that Tarpy thieved and was not all there in the head. Even that Papa said was nothing Jens would take up. Jens on the contrary was no doubt a good influence on Tarpy. Florent was to see that things went well for the summer. But there was no Tarpy when he arrived. Only a very unhappy Jens.

  I asked if we didn't go too far could we still jack off? Tomorrow. I added that for the distance of it. He reached up and pulled my head down to his. Nose to nose. We could go too far. Way too far. And break our hearts and be miserable but that was not now.

  I squealed and wiggled onto him in a round of hugs. His legs with my arms. His chest with my legs. We rolled over. A scramble for the candle which went flying. We doused it and took off our shirts and rolled into a hug. He held my balls tight in one hand and stood my peter up with the other. His fingers were spry. Lips ticklish and delicious. Tongue slippery. His peter was as hard as duramen when I had the presence to work it with both hands. I imitated what he did. Short of choking. Our pleasure tossed and bucked to a pitch. Our pleasure. Not being given and giving but giving together and being given together. We did our best to make it last even when we knew we could catch our breath and begin again. My spunk streamed out as from a pull on an udder. Melted out first and then ran stout. The joy of it helped me bolt a deeper reach. I mashed his balls against his crotch and bore down on the swallow. He spilled out a cannikin thick and forspent. Rich. Clover and soda.

  The time was important and nameless. We lit the candle and the pipe. We put on sweaters. Our hair was as messy as goblins' and we reeked of spunk. I took a fine drag on the pipe and turned pale. Florent laughed. I laughed when I could. I wobbled. We ate dried pears and apples. We peed into the rain.

  We talked crazy and silly. Florent licked my peter like a puppy. Kissed me on the belly button. Wrestled me into a hug and licked me behind the ears. I wiggled free and sat on his chest and pinned his arms with my legs. His eyes shone in the candlelight. I slid backward between his thighs so that I could fool with his peter. His splendid peter. It was limber but fat. There was more neck to it than mine between the eave of the head and the ruckle of the foreskin drawn back. More bore to the keel duct. A niftier rake to the tilt of the glans. Down and up once. Twice. Thrice. And it was as tough as a plow handle. I plied the slippage with a mind to the outlandish. To be headlong generous. To outdo. I rode the foreskin full stretch with a swirl of tongue deep on the downstroke. Shallow with a flicker on the up. I put a thraw into the treadle. For style. A thropple dive plumb to the bush. A slow rippling passage. A fast bouncing passage. A jog. A trot. A sprint. When he squirmed to join up I signalled no. Lie back and feel. I was frisky and longwinded.

  The rain died to a drizzle and we heard the night hunters stirring about. Our candle was almost out. A wonderful quiet replaced the drums of the rain.

  I lay flatling on my elbows to charm the thronging spout to the jolt. I took my time. We had achieved bon ton. That was what it was. I explained to Florent that to Grandmama everything that was as it ought to be was bon ton or it was Sweden-borgian or it was both. The very heavens were not only gardens and cities of light but the perfect and harmonious keeping of bon ton. Florent said that I could have fooled him. He thought we were two randy boys who had found it convenient to invent the pagan world again for their particular use and delight.

  We started another candle. My peter was already in the rounce of a chime when he began its jig. He changed good for better and better for best. He stopped and started. Making it last. Making it ring to the most vibrant thrum of its resonance.

  I was wonderfully sleepy afterwards and stretched and yawned with all my might. Florent opened the tent flaps. It was earliest dawn.

  We walked about in the fresh half light. We got a fire going with considerable trouble but once it got cracking we heaped it high and warmed ourselves. We made porridge and coffee. The sun came out bright and strong. We made caca in the woods and bathed in the stream. The cold water shrivelled our peters and tightened our balls. I was lightheaded enough from lack of sleep and got dizzy as a drunkard on the pipe. We opened both ends of the tent to the sunshine and air. We felt clean and happy. Florent's laughing eyes and rising peter asked me if I was good for another go. We took each other's peters in our warm mouths without any jacking at all and came after a lovely long time and slept just as we were until the sun was directly above us.

  Florent looked at my blisters when we woke. They were well enough for us to push on. We ate and broke camp. We packed our shirts and pants and shorts and set out in boots and rucksacks as naked as savages. I liked the flop of my peter as we walked and the sweet air and the sight of Florent. I imitated the balance of his walk. The set of his hips when he stopped. The clarity of his speech.

  We walked through white birchwoods and high fields of gorse and rocks like grazing sheep. We whistled and sang. It was fun to pee without unbuttoning. We had not combed our hair for days. Florent had not shaved.

  We found a fine spit of land into a lake. Birches. Small round flowers everywhere the color of egg yolk. Mossy rocks. We pitched the tent at the tip. It was too late to fish so we had chipped beef and bran cakes. Dried fruit. Florent was proud of his fire and said it was a domestic animal. Man's first tamed thing. We made a good batch of coffee. I was getting the hang of the pipe. We passed it back and forth. We did some Greek. Heard some of the Iliad.

  We turned in early. We talked a long time snug and close in the bedroll. Florent said that I fell asleep in the middle of saying a sentence.

  I would have liked a shirt at least the next morning but bore my goose pimples without complaint. We saw deer grazing at the edge of the wood. Two badgers loping through the bush back to their sett for the day. We ate our midday meal on the flat of a boulder that caught the sun in the dark of a cedar forest. We nuzzled each other some for the fun of it after we had lit the pipe. To show that we could be free. Florent made me a garland of flowers and put it on my head to wear. He said it was Greek. Something Achilles would do for Patroclus.

  Each day was different. A world a day. Pine woods all of one day. Meadows and rocks the next. The weather kept beautiful and we turned so brown that the gold hair on our arms and legs stood out white against the dark of our skin. We were vain of our sunbrowned peters.

  It was on a promontory jutting out over a sea of treetops that we did the most for the longest. We liked the place for its grand view and height and floor of larch needles. There was a rock with a dip in it just right for sheltering a fire. We found the place in the early afternoon and decided to be lazy and stay. There was just room for the tent among the trees. When we were all squared away Florent said that he had never been hornier. Which made my mouth go dry and a tickle stagger up my peter.

  Florent held up a hand. For silence. I too heard footsteps and voices. Out here? Florent fished our underpants out of the rucksacks. Decent
enough for hunters or Lapps. We peered over the ledge of the rock. The jingle of harness. Through the trees we could make out a horse and wagon and someone walking alongside. So there was a trail below. We saw movement and not shapes. A flick of yellow in the green. The nodding head of a horse. The squeak of a wooden axle.

  Florent shinnied up a tree. I admired the trim white pod of his underpants as he climbed. The camber of his legs like a sailor in the rigging. The bunt of his chest. The creak of the wagon lost itself in the muddled soft sounds of the woods.

  Florent said it was a medicine man and his wagon or a travelling magician perhaps. He saw a colored sign which he couldn't read on the side. The man on foot wore a white top hat. He could not see who had the reins.

  He dropped down and shucked his underpants. Me too. He said that this called for coffee and pipe. Meeting another soul in so remote a place. Coffee and pipe. I had been ready for randy doings. Coffee was a mood with Florent. It set him studying. A good fire boiled a pan of water. We had fragrant coffee in no time. I sipped from his cup and took drags on his pipe. Which made me giddy. I straddled his thighs so that our peters touched. He reached under and grabbed my balls. I held the gowpen of his. An easy clutch and good.

  He knocked the pipe out and we began. It was lovely and crazy. Twice we did each other and twice we came all tangled together. We had supper and watched the stars come out and the red moon. We made the tent trig with a candle. I jacked Florent for a loving hour. For the richness of it and the long fun. And he me except that I kept starting to shoot off and would come a squirt which he would lick from my tummy or his fingers and begin carefully again. Then we sank down on each other to the hilt and grunted for sheer piggishness and drove our pleasure to the quick and swagger alone saw us through until we could loll awhile and sit on the rock passing the pipe back and forth.

  What noises you hear in the deep of a forest at night. Rushes through leaves. Hoots. Caterwauls. Squeaks. Growls. Twitters. Somewhere a distant river.