the drifter
And what is written in the pages of the half-book man’s tattered tome? Is it his own story, set down there in his own words, by his own hand? In his own blood? Are there lines in the book telling sweet tales of his children, his wife, his village? Does the book tell of his own fate, a fate already delivered and executed? Does it contain the lines of his favorite poet? Does it collect the tattered dreams of his people, people dying, falling daily in that distant land? Does it foretell the future of those still living? Are there more wars to come? The sisters see clearly that the half-book man has walked through more than one, more than a few wars. If he is an oracle, he does not speak. But in the way he holds his head, tilted and still, as though listening, in the way his eyes look into a space far distant from the one he occupies, by the way he grips and caresses his book, and by the way his book seems to speak back to him, the sisters guess it is a past he holds on to. The book holds something beloved and spent, a story of a life lived elsewhere, of life before the knowledge of war. And yet the manner in which the half-book man occupies the present—not aimlessly, but deliberately, walking the halls of the sisters’ house, the streets of their neighborhood, the alleyways of their city—tells the sisters that though he is homeless, unbound, he is not superfluous to the spaces he now drifts through. And that the book in his hand is something like a towline, which, binding the past, tugs and heaves it into the present, moment by moment.
Enter and Exit
as you like, dear reader.
rice
So the family continued to practice the old life in the new land—scouring the rice for stones, plucking the feathers from dead chickens, draining the curd to form cheese, growing the grains to make porridge, stirring the porridge for twenty-four hours while praying to the dead saints.
the first river
The first river ran through the house and had its source somewhere unknowable and only guessed at by the sisters. Perhaps the source of the first river was the kitchen faucet, which sometimes in the late evening or the early morning hours ran of its own accord. Perhaps the river had its beginnings in one of antique teapots that lined Mother’s china cabinet shelves and bubbled out from that pot’s chipped spout. No, looking back, the source of the first river was Father’s bosom. It was, after all, where his sensibilities resided. His heart, like a spring, filled, spilled over, and murmured even as he slept; he was a silent man otherwise and kept his emotions hidden by day. He moved wordlessly around and between the six females in his life. He ate their many hand-prepared dishes with childlike relish, listened to their conversations, adding a nod here, a smile here, tended their garden of fruits, herbs, and flowers (his roses were their pride and they, his roses), and with his handyman tools built the sisters their first swing set, their first tree house, a grape arbor to give them shade from the unyielding late summer sun, and an office for himself in the garage, a room within a room, and not anywhere in their way, a private space that told of man alone.
With their father at work by day, it was the same river that carried the girls to the shores of this quiet room in the garage. And this room was sacred to the girls, who left the sun and the grass to sneak into the dark space in search of treasure. Once inside, they shut the door behind them, keeping out the river that had delivered them there, for they didn’t want Father to know they were rummaging through his things. At the right time of day, the tiny window that looked out onto the garden brought in sufficient light for their explorations. But more often, the girls worked beneath the buzz of the single fluorescent tube that ran over Father’s desk. On this man’s island, there was, among the many dead timepieces, an old wristwatch that gained sheen over time from the girls’ curious fingers, which never tired of pulling the old timekeeper from Father’s top drawer, rubbing it, wrapping it around their skinny wrists, once, twice, winding it, and replacing it in the cold drawer. The old wristwatch had a history, but it was not theirs; Mother had bought it secondhand. There were, also in this room, boxes of chewing gum and mints, an olive-green typewriter, which Father kept covered with two handkerchiefs, several dozen news magazines lined up against the wall, and an old tape player, stapler, and broken key chains awaiting repair. Here in this space that was Father’s alone, the sisters pulled out compasses and rulers and drew their own bridges and skyscrapers, cars, moons, constellations, and coastlines. The sisters hummed along to the river’s song as it ran outside the office door. They took in the smell and the character of everything that was not girl or woman: Father’s sweater hanging on the back of his chair; his forever near-empty bottle of cologne; his green glass paperweight, which they picked up with both hands to hold against the light; his nail clippers, too large for their small fingers to handle; his filing cabinets filled with carefully tallied and marked bills, letters, and documents. Before leaving Father’s treasure island, the sisters closed and locked all the drawers again, pushed in the desk chair, lined up the pens and the pencils by color in their trays, and listened once more for the ticking heart of the old timepiece through the closed desk drawer before shutting the office door and stepping back into the river.
The first river traveled through the house, around the bases of lamps, beneath the sofa, and over the tight weave of Eastern rugs. It flowed beneath the dining chairs, ran in, then out of closets over the girls’ shoes, into and out of his wife’s coat pockets. The playful river chased the cat, soaked its tail, then gurgled before it continued out the back door and into the garden to water the beds of herbs and the fruit trees. If the girls were not paying attention, running too fast in the house or fighting too roughly with a sister, they might slip and fall into the water. The river shifted its course daily, though over time it was evident to the sisters that it had its favorite paths too. It formed channels at the base of the kitchen sink and the stove, where it ran regularly to cool the feet of Mother and the sisters, who daily cooked and washed the dishes. Though Father was not home in the afternoons, the river that had its source in his chest ran alongside his daughters as they lay on their stomachs on a rug or in the garden, calculating numbers, drawing flowers, reading tales. Its sounds, as it ran past them on lazy afternoons, reminded some of the sisters of the brook that ran through their uncle’s farm in that other distant country, the little brook that meandered through the fields, past strawberries and reeds, through peach and quince orchards, and at the feet of ancient goats and sheep. And was this river running through their small and neat house in the sunny land that same little gurgling farm brook?
Yes, the first river had its source in Father. By day the house vibrated with the many voices of the girls, of family, of living. Only two occasions silenced the boisterous house: Father’s regular prayers and deep night, the hours of sleep. Father always chose the quietest corner of the house to set down his prayer rug and the moment he had, the entire house fell silent. The sisters, playing a hand of cards or scratching their names into the heels of their tennis shoes or hanging upside down from the limbs of the tree in the yard, all fell under the spell that was their father’s solemn prayer and blessing. And the reverent words that fell from his lips traveled downriver through all the corners of the house, lulling the sisters, Mother, and the cat into meditation. But no sooner was the prayer rug lifted from the floor than a yell or a roar of laughter lifted the veil of silence and drowned out the river again. At night, when the family lay in bed dreaming, the sister not sleeping would listen to the gurglings and whisperings of the river as it tumbled beneath telephone and chair, meandered over rug and around table legs, slipped over cushions and beneath beds until it carried the sister into dreams of endless fields of watermelon and clucking hens perched in the limbs of quince trees.
the second river
The second river that ran, ran hidden and deep. This subterranean river traveled through the cavernous earth a mile below the house, whichever house the family lived in that year. The sisters had little knowledge of the existence, let alone the source, of this river, though somehow
they sensed it and were not entirely surprised when occasionally it traveled vertically, found a gap between the red rugs, rose into the air, and silently writhed like an angry serpent in the middle of their living room. At other times, one sister or another, digging deeply enough on a hunch, discovered the flowing water and drank thirstily from the well. But the ancient water had dissolved strange minerals on its journey, and no sooner had the sister satisfied her thirst than the memory of the river was all but erased from her mind and her tongue dry again. This great and terrible river ran from sources secret and took courses deep and meandering. Yet still it reflected the Milky Way on the surface of its waters roiling and its waters silent as it journeyed from unknown to unknown.
If the sisters had stopped to marvel, they would have wondered: how old was this river and where had its travels taken it? What pressures forced it down which pathways? The sisters knew that earth was heavy in all places, but more burdensome in some: did the river flow freely here and back up there? Was the river born of two parents or one? Did the earth not hoard its treasures? Had the river, on its journeys through the cavities and vaults of the earth, not seen its stores of rubies, emeralds, and jade? If the sisters had consciously known of the river’s existence, they would have asked it these questions and more. But endless and great as the second river was, it ran mostly silently, and the sisters remained ignorant.
It seems that both fortune and misfortune had joined hands to wed this river to this family. The family did not speak of the second river. Though they each sensed it, they knew not what to call it. It was nameless. Each thought it was her or his own alone. So each kept it secret, hidden beneath skin, muscle, and bone; his or her subcutaneous secret: unnamable, unnatural, cursed. They felt gravity drawing them down but felt more than just the ground pushing back against their own earthly weight. The river too pushed and sometimes pushed hard. Each felt it uniquely: as a pressure below the diaphragm or at the base of the skull; as a terrible itch on the soles of the feet that peaked in the middle hours of the night; as a burning sensation in the corners of the eyes; as a rough and permanent stone in the back of the throat. And each hid the sensations in her, in his own way: Mother swallowed and swallowed again the saliva that ran endlessly over her tongue; Father kept silent by day and kept his feet uncovered by night, summer and winter, autumn and spring; one sister pushed back, into walls and cupboards and sisters; another sister, not knowing that the source of her tears was this same great river that pushed on all the others, let its mineral-rich waters run freely from her eyes behind closed doors in the few momentarily empty spaces in the busy house.
In the backyard, the girls mined for earthworms and gemstones. At the base of the rosebushes, they dug shallow wells, which they lined with shells collected the previous weekend at the beach. They attached a miniature plastic bucket to a string and let it down into the well. But the greedy roots of the many-colored rosebushes absorbed the cupfuls of tap water the sisters poured into the hole before they were able to draw any back out in their doll-sized bucket. The little engineers took the well apart again and used the wet earth to fashion cups and beads and bird whistles, which they baked in the noonday sun. And they came back the following morning to collect their cracked earthenware, to begin anew the digging and construction of a shallow well.
Had the sisters guessed, they would have dug deeper. Had they spoken to each other of the pressure on the soles of their feet and on their kneecaps as they knelt beside the rosebushes, and had they discovered that the moist earth pushed hard and mercilessly on all of them, they would have brought out Father’s picks and shovels from the garage. They would have dug a mile down and questioned the river themselves: what is your message and why do you trouble us? Do you have no shame, at your age? Are you not the same river that supplied the well on our uncle’s farm? Did you not reflect grandmother’s shrinking image over the many years she bent over the edge of the well to let down to you her chipped pail? Did our widow-aunt not flavor her morning bread with your salt? The eldest sister distinctly remembered the hiss of steam that came off the shaped dough after it was slapped against the side of the hot clay oven in the farm’s courtyard. She knew that hiss and would have matched it to the river’s had the sisters known to dig for the source of the pressure on their small bodies. But each kept her secret to herself. And each used a shell, a rock, or her fingers alone to dig the shallow well that refused to hold the many cupfuls of tap water the sisters brought to it from the kitchen.
winter harvest
The people of the small, mountainous kingdom lived quiet, industrious lives that peaked at dusk and dawn with the first and the last stars. By the faint light of the stars, they celebrated births and weddings, vegetable harvests and animal sacrifices, and the visions and words of their dead saints. The people of the land loved their mountains as they loved their saints. On holidays, they traveled over desert and down river to picnic or play at the foothills of the many-mountains: tying rope to the limbs of strong trees, their youth swung over seas of blue poppies or red tulips; old men lay in the shade of wild orchards, taking in the delicate scent and color of apple blossoms; in summer, lovers walked off to fill their skirts or caps with mountain strawberries and shared them as they shared kisses; in winter, the adventurous sledded joyfully down the mountains’ many faces.
To their towns, the people welcomed commerce, which traveled over roads direct and roads winding to deliver pomegranates, pine nuts, and ice from the mountains, and rhubarb, quince, and carrots from the village farms. Milk, meat, fruits, and grains were ample. The people blessed the mountains and thanked the farmers. And what they could not presently use, they shared, or preserved for the long winter. Neighbors passed loaves of bread or baskets of ripe peaches over their walls in every direction. They gathered in this or that yard to preserve this or that bounty. Entire days and many strong arms were spent driving the cranks of small grinders to turn whole tomatoes into pulp, which filled the air with the fruit’s sharp-sweet scent, and jars to the brim. Miles of wash line were volunteered, cleared of laundry, and draped with herbs or salted meats left to dry in the crisp air. At the end of such days, the neighborhood women returned to their own homes and husbands smelling of tomatoes, spearmint, goat’s cheese, or slaughtered lamb.
The people of the land honored their king. When their beloved king took to the sick bed or left to visit neighboring lands, they prayed for his recovery and blessed his travels. And when their benefactor opened his arms to his helpful neighbors who, traveling the long roads over mountains and across deserts, arrived to build the highways and the many-tiered spires in their cities, the people blessed their king for his grace. When the visiting neighbors gazed too long upon their arid landscape and saw that it glimmered, the people of the small kingdom shivered but looked to their ruler for comfort and guidance. And when he disappeared, as if into thin desert air, the people knit their brows and pondered. Though soon, others came to take his place and dressed in his clothes and waved their arms with great fervor and bowed their heads in deep piety. But not all of the people were deceived. And those not deceived vanished. And those who went asking after the disappeared did not return. The people saw that the new leader was hungry and not satisfied with the tulip or the apple. They watched in awe as he himself vanished before their eyes and was followed by a succession of new leaders, who appeared and disappeared equally abruptly. Each arrived hungrier, with even more ardor for the land, more zeal in his fist. And all this disappearing, so abrupt and sweeping, vexed the people who were accustomed to accounting for all that came out of the earth and returned to it. So they took to hiding their loved ones. And still the new leaders were not to be put off, needed to be sated—for the taking of a land requires the letting of blood to be authentic. The newcomers looked beneath beds, stairs, and skirts, in attics, cellars, and chicken coups. They dragged out daughters and sons, expectant mothers and bridegrooms, old men and goats, and slaughtered all.
The people of the land looked
to their beloved mountains and, contemplating the ways of the mountains, remembered that in their depths the great giants stored the kingdom’s many treasures. Thus, the people who were accustomed to burying their own dead resolved to bury their precious living instead. And within their own depths. So the cutting, grinding, and eating of the young and the bright, the learned and the prized, looked from above not unlike the great harvests of peaches and watermelons in late summer. The migrating bird, countryless, flying over the kingdom that winter, and seeing that arid land brighten with the colors of sweet summer fruit, was for a moment disoriented.
F
F l o w e r s . The sisters were like five flowers, bloomed precociously. Nurtured by knowledge untimely, each developed into a curious blossom.
Follow. Come now, do not be hesitant. You do not need a yarn to draw you.
Forward? Did I say the only way forward is through the alphabet? In jest only. You see, here, all of the pieces are movable. And all of the days are one, the same. So please, enter, commence, reside, depart freely, anywhere, anytime, as you like.
holiday
Mother is happy. It is only her third year celebrating the old holiday in the new land and she has brought together enough friends from the first land, introduced them one to another over the months and the short years, made uncles, aunts, and cousins of them for her daughters, and bound them all enough to one another so that the old holiday this year will be something of what it once was. They have secured a place at a city park, beneath a large wooden canopy and adjacent to a small lake and a playground. Because the holiday falls midweek, the many families will hold off and gather at the park on the weekend to enjoy the festivities, to grill the marinated meats, to feast on the vibrant sumptuous fare laid out across the picnic tables by the many families, to share the tea and gossip over hands of cards, to toss the balls, slip down the slides, and feed the geese and the fish at the water’s edge.
Above Us the Milky Way Page 8