He misses the old days. He misses the lapping of the water in the breeze, the rustling of the bulrushes. He misses the choruses of praise sung to him by the frogs in the pink light of evening. Nobody sings to him now.
Meanwhile the Stork King has eaten all the frogs and sold the tadpoles into sexual slavery. Now he is draining the pond. Soon it will be turned into desirable residential estates.
FASTER
Walking was not fast enough, so we ran. Running was not fast enough, so we galloped. Galloping was not fast enough, so we sailed. Sailing was not fast enough, so we rolled merrily along on long metal tracks. Long metal tracks were not fast enough, so we drove. Driving was not fast enough, so we flew.
Flying isn’t fast enough, not fast enough for us. We want to get there faster. Get where? Wherever we are not. But a human soul can only go as fast as a man can walk, they used to say. In that case, where are all the souls? Left behind. They wander here and there, slowly, dim lights flickering in the marshes at night, looking for us. But they’re not nearly fast enough, not for us, we’re way ahead of them, they’ll never catch up. That’s why we can go so fast: our souls don’t weigh us down.
EATING THE BIRDS
We ate the birds. We ate them. We wanted their songs to flow up through our throats and burst out of our mouths, and so we ate them. We wanted their feathers to bud from our flesh. We wanted their wings, we wanted to fly as they did, soar freely among the treetops and the clouds, and so we ate them. We speared them, we clubbed them, we tangled their feet in glue, we netted them, we spitted them, we threw them onto hot coals, and all for love, because we loved them. We wanted to be one with them. We wanted to hatch out of clean, smooth, beautiful eggs, as they did, back when we were young and agile and innocent of cause and effect, we did not want the mess of being born, and so we crammed the birds into our gullets, feathers and all, but it was no use, we couldn’t sing, not effortlessly as they do, we can’t fly, not without smoke and metal, and as for the eggs we don’t stand a chance. We’re mired in gravity, we’re earthbound. We’re ankle-deep in blood, and all because we ate the birds, we ate them a long time ago, when we still had the power to say no.
SOMETHING HAS HAPPENED
Something has happened. But how? Was it overnight, or has it been creeping up on us and we’ve only just noticed? It’s the girls, the young and pretty girls. They used to sing like sirens, like mermaids, all sweet and liquid, breezy melodies, wavy melodies, but now they’re shorn of melody, though their mouths open and close as before. Have their tongues been cut out?
This is true as well of the cries of babies, the wailing at funerals, the screams that used to arise, especially at night, from the mad, from the tortured. It’s the same thing with the birds: flying as before, spreading out their feathers as before, heads thrown back, beaks gaping, but they’re mute. Mute, or muted? Who has been at work, with a great carpet of invisible snow that blots out sound?
Listen: the leaves no longer rustle, the wind no longer sighs, our hearts no longer beat. They’ve fallen silent. Fallen, as if into the earth. Or is it we who have fallen? Perhaps it’s not the world that is soundless but we who are deaf. What membrane seals us off, from the music we used to dance to? Why can’t we hear?
NIGHTINGALE
People die, and then they come back at night when you’re asleep. By the time you’re my age this happens more frequently. In the dream you know they’re dead; funny thing is, they know it too. The usual places are a boat or a forest, less often a cabin or an isolated farmhouse, and, even more rarely, a room. If a room, there’s often a window; if a window, there will be curtains—white—or heavy draperies, also white. Never venetian blinds: they don’t like that kind of lighting, the day or night falling in slantwise through the slats. It makes them flicker even more than they normally do.
Sometimes they’re friends, and they want you to know they’re all right. That kind might make a remark or two, nothing earth-shattering. It’s like the screen when you turn off the television, one of them said—it’s just a loss of contact. Another one—the setting was a woodland walk, in fall, orange and yellow leaves, that crisp smell—this one said, Isn’t it beautiful?
Some don’t say anything. They might smile, they might not; they might turn away once they know you’ve seen them. They want you to see them: that’s the point. They want you to know they’re still around and they can’t be forgotten or dismissed.
Procne turned up the other night. Got in through the window, as she always does. Right away I wished I’d taken a sleeping pill: that would have shut her out. But you can’t take pills all the time, and she waits. She waits until I’m unconscious.
You shouldn’t have let him lock me up in that shack, she said.
The location was a room; the window in question had white curtains. We’ve been through this before, I said. You weren’t locked up. You could have opened the door. Anyway, I didn’t know.
You knew, she said. You repressed it, but you must have known.
I knew you’d been his first wife, I said. Everyone knew that. But according to him you were dead.
That’s what they wanted you to think, she said. I might as well have been, but I wasn’t. Meanwhile, you were getting ready to take my place.
I had to, I said. I had to get married. He raped me. What else could I have done? Don’t tell me you were jealous.
Jealous? she said. She gave a kind of caw. Not for an instant! I knew his dirty ways, he could never leave me alone. Believe me, you were welcome to that part of it. I only wish he hadn’t cut out my tongue.
That is a lie, I said. He never did that. You made the decision not to speak, is all. The tongue part of the story is a misreading of a temple wall painting, that’s what people say now. Those things weren’t tongues, they were laurel leaves for the priestess, so she could hallucinate, and prophesy, and—
You and your archeology, said Procne. He cut out my tongue, all right. He knew I’d tell stories.
Maybe he had his reasons, I said. If he did cut out your tongue. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that. I’m not excusing his behaviour. It wasn’t good. None of us behaved very well, and I regret that now. The two of us never got along when we were young, but you were always my sister and I loved you. That’s why he kept you a secret from me.
I knew you wouldn’t excuse it. His behaviour, I mean. That’s why I sent you the message—to let you know I wasn’t dead after all.
Then why did you send me the message?
I wanted you to avoid the mistakes I made, that’s all.
What mistakes?
In answer she lifted up her hands. They were wet, they glistened. Our son, she said. I couldn’t stop myself.
