The Lizard Cage

by Karen Connelly

  He wanders off. In the room where the orphans eat together on the wooden floor, he begins chatting idly with a novice who’s doing school-work, his dark orange robe half unbound. The boy complains that he isn’t very good at math. Teza finishes the novice’s page of sums while the boy rewraps his robe, then they go outside to play.

  Unable to remember the boy clearly, he puts Free El Salvador in his place. Perhaps it’s all vanity and nostalgia, emotions he believes he’s relinquished. Questions replace his memories. Why shouldn’t it be possible? The Hsayadaw takes care of so many children. If they bring thousands of men into the prison, why can’t they send out a single child? Free El Salvador hasn’t committed a crime.

  Chit Naing has to help. He will help. He must. If for no other reason, then simply because he feels guilty. The jailer will have to go to the pongyi-kyaung and speak with the Hsayadaw, remind him that Dr. Kyaw Win Thu used to treat the children and the monks at the monastery school. And every year Daw Sanda used to give ahlu—a noble offering of new robes to the novices. At least in 1988 she was still doing this. Teza went with her that year. They also took food to the children. If the Hsayadaw knew where Free El Salvador was from, he would take him in, Teza is sure of it, no matter how crowded the old monastery school might be. Out of love and respect for Teza’s parents, he would extend his love to the boy.

  But what if the abbot has died? The last time Teza saw him, he must have been in his late sixties, nimble enough but also fragile, parchment-skinned. Teza remembers walking up some stairs behind him. The Hsayadaw hitched up his saffron robes, careful not to trip on the worm-eaten steps. Teza watched the muscles contract in the abbot’s long, skinny calves. The parallel tendons at the back of his ankles and knees were like tension cables that held the whole delicate mechanism together. What if the mechanism has slowed to a stop?

  Teza taps his fingers on the cement floor. Then he closes his eyes and tries to still his rattling mind. He sees the abbot’s face, his eyes almost disappeared in the deep creases of a smile.

  Weariness settles into him. Too much thinking. And talking. Speaking with the boy has fatigued him. His jaw is throbbing, pushing pain into the rest of his head. Things get worse in the evening, when the labor of getting through the day leaves him completely wrung out. He will meditate, then sleep. He sits down in the center of the cell and genuflects three times, facing the bars and the world beyond the bars.

  Metta.

  Karuna.

  Mudita.

  Upekkha.

  These are the Four Divine Abidings. Love. Compassion. Joy in the good fortune of others. Equanimity.

  Upekkha. He begins and ends with this word. Equanimity in the face of what must be. The breath travels easily through his body, expanding the muscles of his back over his rib cage, beneath his shoulder blades. It used to be so hard to calm his mind and sit quietly in his body, but there’s no battle anymore. He breathes until the word upekkha is nothing but an empty form, a skeleton of letters with air moving through it. Then the word itself blows away with the slight wind of the heart. The lungs expand and contract until he feels as if he has no body. The pain joins this lightness, despite its great weight. He carries the burden, though the burden is not himself. He is nothing but a thread of air.

  Yet he desires. Precisely this silence, this peace. He wants to stretch it, stay inside it, where he is unbound. Blood pumps bright new shards of glass into his jaw. He feels tendons, muscles in the bottom of his mouth, his tongue, all thumping with his slow pulse. To still the raging mind, to calm the body in great pain: he has found these treasures in his breath.

  If desire is the root of suffering, as the Buddha said, is it wrong to crave this peace? The Buddha must have desired enlightenment. Otherwise he would have remained a spoiled prince in a grand palace.

  Can it be so easy, to enter the stream? Sotapatti magga. He’s impressed with himself for remembering the Pali term. It’s been years since he studied such things. Stream-entry is the first step to becoming an enlightened one. To enter the stream is to receive the first glimpse of Nibbana, nirvana, fire unbound from its fuel, gone cold and passionless. That is the nature of the mind released.

  His own name means fire. Fire and glory, Teza. How this word strengthened him, tied him to Burma’s history. He remembers the beginning, in the interrogation center, clinging so fiercely to the only thing he had: teza. Can he desire the end of his own name?

  And do what? Take another one, the name of a monk? Becoming enlightened has to be more difficult than acquiring a new name, or sitting through a challenging meditation. Otherwise, wouldn’t everyone attain it? The cage would be full of Bodhisattvas, their eyes all shining light as they shat in their buckets and scribbled secret messages to the world. In the Buddha’s day, it happened, the texts tell the stories: after the crowds heard the great teacher speak, they attained enlightenment while milking their cows or squatting in the fields. But that was a long time ago. The world must have been simpler when the Buddha was alive.

  If his mother caught him thinking of himself as a Hpaya-Laung, an enlightened being, she would scold him and tell him to stop being so immodest.

  Perhaps it’s not enlightenment he’s glimpsed, but his end.

  There. Death.

  Does it terrify, such a small word? The last one before the next birth. Can dying to the present body be this, passing through all the forms and their skeletons until there is nothing left but empty flesh, its spirit unhoused for a while, waiting?

  From far away, he hears human voices. They come nearer now, drawing him up from the depths of his breath.

  He doesn’t want to return. The voices pull and pull. The singer opens his eyes, slowly. To be borne, it must happen slowly. Moving his hands from his lap will be like shifting stones. In less than a minute Chit Naing and the chattering doctor will come around the corner of the outer wall. The singer would like to tell them to visit another time. He is busy now.

  He remembers the world, that growing tree of thought and possibility. Images shift through his mind, touch one another, leaves turning to light. Free El Salvador. His mother watering her orchids. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi in her compound, at a small gathering of students, turning to him with an open smile and asking, Where is your guitar, Ko Teza, will you play something for us? The Hsayadaw, on reaching the second floor of the monastery school, speaking in a quiet voice, Teza, you are like a son to me. As your father was also. So many fine children make me a very fortunate old man. He stretched his thin arms wide, as though to embrace the whole of the old monastery. In the same instant, two small novices sweeping the compound looked up at the landing and saw their beloved teacher. They bowed to him, and waved, then started to laugh.

  Keys clank and ring at the iron bars. Teza grimaces at the sound, magnified in the raw state after meditation. If an ant were on his arm now, it would feel as heavy as a small brown cat. He lets a last breath go and looks up to see Chit Naing peering at him. His glasses flicker as he speaks.

  “Ko Teza, are you all right?”

  Teza nods.

  Chit Naing pulls open the iron grille. Both jailer and doctor walk into the cell. The round-faced doctor in his grubby white coat is all hustle and bustle, unfastening his black bag, pulling things out of it. “First I check your heartbeat, see if you’re still alive.” He unbuttons the bottom of his white coat and squats down with the snaky stethoscope in his hands. “How is the Songbird doing this evening? Still not singing much, eh? But Jailer Chit Naing tells me you’re talking more.”

  Feeling the warm breath on the side of his face like a wet tongue, Teza leans away and closes his eyes again, repressing a shudder. He does not want to be touched. As the no takes form in his mind, the doctor’s hand is on his wrist, feeling for the pulse, pressing. Teza pulls his hand away and holds it against his chest. He crosses his other arm on top of it and whispers, “My heart’s still beating.”

  “Your pulse is a little slow.”

  “I just finished meditation.”<
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  Chit Naing says, “See, Doctor? That explains why he’s so quiet.” The doctor frowns at the jailer, then at his reluctant patient. Chit Naing clears his throat. “Why don’t you just give him his injection, Doctor, so we can go?”

  “Not possible. For precisely the reasons I mentioned earlier, I want to check his heartbeat.”

  “You were just saying how late it is. The sooner we finish up here, the better.”

  The doctor stares rudely at the jailer, clearly miffed by these directives. Crouching puts him at a disadvantage, so he stands, drawing himself up to his full height, still a head shorter than Chit Naing. “Listening to a man’s heartbeat does not take half an hour.”

  “I appreciate that, Doctor, but we are disturbing the inmate.”

  “Disturbing him?” The doctor ejects a scornful little laugh. “Jailer Chit Naing, I’m sure I don’t have to remind you, of all people, that we’re not in a hotel. And I am doing this as a favor. Better to say the inmate is disturbing me, keeping me from my family.”

  The words shoot back and forth over Teza’s head. He would like to cover his shaven scalp with his hands.

  “That’s why I suggest you just give him his injection and we leave.”

  “I refuse to give him any morphine unless he cooperates. Look at him, skin and bones. He’s not eating. Even a man with a broken jaw shouldn’t be so thin.” He barks at Teza, “You’re getting the equivalent of three meals a day. Why have you lost so much weight?” Then he turns back to Chit Naing. “I’m going to check his heartbeat while he still has one, and I’m going to talk to the Chief Warden about this again. Then we can decide how we’ll proceed.”

  Chit Naing has no choice but to acquiesce. He takes a step back and bends down. “Ko Teza, you heard the doctor. I’m afraid he’s right. Let him check your heartbeat and he’ll give you your shot.”

  Teza looks into his friend’s eyes. “I don’t need the injection.”

  Chit Naing cocks his head, unsure if he’s heard correctly. “It’s the morphine, Teza, not an antibiotic.”

  Teza glances at the doctor. “Yes, I know. I don’t want it. I don’t want any more favors.”

  “No more favors, eh?” The doctor grunts. “That’s fine with me.” Chit Naing hears anger in the words. The man’s thinking about the money he’ll lose. The doctor has wrapped the stethoscope around his hand in such a stranglehold that he has trouble untangling it and stuffing it back into his bag. “I can understand your martyrdom up to a point, but tell me why you aren’t eating. If you’re talking this much, back on your soapbox, then you are well enough to drink rice soup. What should I tell the Chief Warden?”

  “I keep the Eight Precepts.”

  The doctor looks back at Chit Naing. “You see? I told you.” Then he addresses Teza. “Idiot. No food after noon is slow suicide for a man in your condition. You must know that.”

  Teza drops his head, as if he needs to look at his hands in order to rearrange them on his lap, one on top of the other. He wonders if he is ready to begin. He could announce his decision now, to the doctor. But that would be too fast, a hasty reaction to the man’s badgering. First he needs to talk to Jailer Chit Naing about the boy. He will make things happen, but at his own pace.

  Angry now, the doctor announces, “This inmate is being uncooperative, Jailer Chit Naing. Injured or not, I hope he isn’t beyond punishment.”

  “Thank you for your suggestion, Doctor.”

  The man snaps his bag shut and bends down, eyeing Teza. “It makes no difference to me if you starve yourself, but the Chief will have you beaten until you start eating properly. If he wants you to eat, you will eat.”

  Teza replies, “Doctor, the threat of more torture is enough to ruin anyone’s appetite.”

  “Not mine. I’m very hungry and I’m going home for dinner. Jailer Chit Naing, I will see you tomorrow.” The doctor opens the grille and struts officiously out of the cell.

  The jailer takes off his glasses, pulls a handkerchief from his pocket, and polishes away, as though clean lenses will enable him to see through his confusion. He can’t understand why Teza didn’t tell him about the Eight Precepts. He could have arranged for food to be brought to the cell at dawn, so the singer could keep the precepts and still get enough to eat.

  He looks carefully at Teza’s face. The area around his left eye is still dark and puffy with old bruising. The mouth, of course, will always be askew. It still looks rather gruesome, the sort of deformity people either stare at or turn away from, but Chit Naing is used to it.

  He focuses elsewhere, the everywhere of the singer’s skin, stretched tight over cheekbones and temples and knuckles and nose and starving knobs of elbows. Surely, the jailer thinks, I’ve noticed this. How could he have missed those thin muscles tightening in a neck that looks longer, ropier, every few days? The ribbed cartilage of the esophagus has become visible, rung after rung going down.

  Yet the singer has never complained. Chit Naing didn’t see because Teza didn’t force him to the truth. Since they transferred the singer to the white house, he has stopped complaining altogether, stopped even physical gestures of complaint. Chit Naing doesn’t understand it, nor does he understand why Teza’s passivity frightens him. For weeks Chit Naing’s utmost concern has been getting morphine through to the singer and paying for it in the most discreet way possible.

  And now he’s refusing the damn morphine!

  “This doesn’t make any sense, Teza. What do you mean, you don’t want any more favors?”

  The singer exhales a labored breath. The pulsing he felt in his jaw during meditation is a ripping now, red sheets of muscle and fascia torn, one strip after the other. He opens his mouth as little as possible to speak, but each word yanks at the tissue around the original wound. Five weeks ago that stupid doctor said the fracture was clean, but Teza is sure something in him is shattered. Not his spirit, not his heart, but bone.

  He would like Chit Naing to come back tomorrow morning, after he has slept and slurped down his morning rice. Then he will have more strength. Now he wants only to close his eyes and lie down.

  The jailer squats beside him. “Ko Teza, are you all right?”

  These words seem to come from a distance, as if Chit Naing were standing on the other side of the wall. It’s very strange. Teza wonders if his ear is acting up again. He lifts his head and exhales the words painfully. “U Chit Naing, soon I will begin a hunger strike.” He inhales again, lets the breath go. “But first I need your help.”

  . 45 .

  Jumping over one puddle, two puddles, he pretends there are puddles all the way to his shack. He’s careful not to sprint full-out. If he moves too fast, the warders on guard duty will know something’s happening. When he gets to his shack, he opens the door and slips inside, pulling the rat stick in behind him. Shivering, he jams the stick diagonally across the door. Stream water drips off his elbows as his hands stretch out in the dark, touch the corner post, and slide down to the brick where he usually keeps his lighter.

  But it’s not there. It’s not beside or behind the brick. Where did he put his lighter? He feels along the bottom of the shack, slides his finger through the little gutter he makes for the rain, but he can’t find it. Why didn’t he put the lighter back in its place? “Fucking stupid boy!” Only when he swears does he realize that he’s crying.

  His hands go in the other direction, under the rag bed of damp longyis and old blanket, past the big matchbox with the beetle inside, under the plastic bag that protects his postcards of the Shwedagon Pagoda and the Buddha from Pagan. His fingers close around the other plastic bag, which contains matches. Scratch, scratch, rustle in the dark box, not the beetle but the boy, moving a blind, knowing hand. He wipes his wet fingers on his bed, takes a clutch of matches from the bag, strikes a match once, twice, three times.

  The interior of the tiny room flares. Squinting, he lights the yellow candle stub and pushes his rag bed to one side and begins to dig with his tin-can shovel. He
digs and digs, he buried it deeper last time. Where is the pen? Why did he put it down so deep? In frustration he stops digging with the tool and starts scraping the earth away with his fingers, where is the pen? Why isn’t the nat helping him? Where is the pen? It belonged to the Songbird, and the boy knows his prayers were not enough, his offerings were not enough, is that why he’s crying? Yes, the gifts he gave to the Songbird didn’t work, not even the precious egg it wasn’t enough the nat of the tree didn’t help him and the Buddha didn’t help him and he lied a big lie and Handsome said I will kill you and prayers fail so it’s true the junior jailer will kill him.

  Chit Naing abruptly stands up, unwilling to believe what he’s just heard. He wants to think that this is Teza’s idea of a joke, but the singer—sitting like a monk on the floor, bald and gaunt in dirty white prison garb—is clearly serious. Chit Naing hears the treble of anger in his own voice. “A hunger strike? What on earth are you going to strike for? You heard what the doctor just said. Even keeping the Eight Precepts is too much for you.” Another emotion unsettles him far more than anger—an intolerable sense that Teza is betraying him.

  The singer listens as Chit Naing describes the danger of hunger strikes, how they have almost never worked. The prison authorities do not capitulate to the demands of the prisoners, even when they starve themselves. Teza nods patiently. “Yes, I know. I understand that.” He pauses to rest. Chit Naing crouches again beside him. “It will be my own thabeik hmauk.”

  “Like a monk,” Chit Naing says in a defeated whisper.

  “Yes. And like a student too.” Thabeik hmauk is also the word for a student protest, though its origin is much older than a modern university.

  Each man silently remembers the same history, that of hunger strikers from hundreds of years ago, members of the holy sangha. When the monks wanted to protest the corruption and violence of the king and his minions, they paraded through the streets with their alms bowls turned upside down. By refusing to accept offerings from the king, they cut him off from his own wealth—his riches were nothing if he could not make a merit-gift of them for his future lives.