– What should I do, Father?
– Let me have a look at that toe.
– Yes!
– I’ll have to take off your moccasin.
– Yes!
– Here?
– Yes!
– What about here?
– Yes!
– Your toes are cold, Catherine. I’ll have to rub them between my palms.
– Yes!
– Now I’ll blow them, you know, as one blows one’s fingers in the winter.
– Yes!
The priest breathed heavily on her tiny brown toes. What a lovely little cushion her big toe had. The bottoms of her five toes looked like the faces of small children sleeping tucked up under a blanket up to their chins. He started to kiss them good night.
– Tosy rosy tosy rosy.
– Yes!
He nibbled at a cushion, which felt like a rubber grape. He was kneeling as Jesus had kneeled before a naked foot. In an orderly fashion, he inserted his tongue between each toe, four thrusts, so smooth the skin between, and white! He gave his attention to each toe, mouthing it, covering it with saliva, evaporating the saliva by blowing, biting it playfully. It was a shame that four toes should always suffer from loneliness. He forced all her tiny toes into his mouth, his tongue going like a windshield wiper. Francis had done the same for lepers.
– Father!
– Libalobaglobawoganummynummy.
– Father!
– Gobblegobblegogglewoggle. Slurp.
– Baptize me!
– Although some find our reluctance excessive we Jesuits do not rush Indian adults along the path to Baptism.
– I have two feet.
– Indians are fickle. We must protect ourselves from the catastrophe of producing more apostates than Christians.
– Wiggle.
– Comme nous nous défions de l’inconstance des Iroquois, j’en ai peu baptisé hors du danger de mort.
The girl slipped her foot into the moccasin and sat on it.
– Baptize me.
– Il n’y a pas grand nombre d’adultes, parce qu’on ne des baptise qu’avec beaucoup de précautions.
Thus the argument progressed in the shadows on the long house. A mile away Uncle sank to his knees, exhausted. There would be no harvest! But he was not thinking of the kernels he had just sown, he was thinking about the life of his people. All the years, all the hunts, all the wars – it would all come to nothing. There would be no harvest! Even his soul when it ripened would not be gathered to the warm southwest, whence blows the wind which brings sunny days and the bursting corn. The world was unfinished! A deep pain seized his chest. The great wrestling match between Ioskeha, the White one, and Tawiscara, the Dark one, the eternal fight would fizzle out like two passionate lovers falling asleep in a tight embrace. There would be no harvest! Each day the village was growing smaller as more of his brethren left for the new missions. He fumbled for a small wolf he had carved of wood. In the autumn past he had placed the whittled nostrils to his own, inhaling the animal’s courage. Then he had breathed out deeply in order to spread the breath of the animal over a wide area in the forest, and so paralyze all the game in the neighborhood. When he had killed his deer that day he cut out the liver and smeared blood on the mouth of the carved wood wolf. And he prayed: Great Deer, First and Perfect Deer, ancestor of the carcass at my feet, we are hungry. Please do not seek vengeance against me for taking the life of one of your children. Uncle collapsed on the cornfield, gasping for breath. The Great Deer was dancing on his chest, crushing his ribs. They carried him back to the cabin. His niece wept when she saw his face. After a while, when they were alone, the old man spoke.
– He came in, the Black Dress?
– Yes, Father Tekakwitha.
– And you want to be baptized?
– Yes, Father Tekakwitha.
– I will allow you to on one condition: that you promise never to leave Kahnawaké.
– I promise.
– There will be no harvest, my daughter. Our heaven is dying. From every hill, a spirit cries out in pain, for it is being forgotten.
– Sleep.
– Bring me my pipe and open the door.
– What are you doing?
– I am blowing the breath of the tobacco at them, at all of them. It was F.’s theory that White America has been punished by lung cancer for having destroyed the Red Man and stolen his pleasures.
– Try to forgive them, Father Tekakwitha.
– I can’t.
As he blew the smoke weakly at the open door Uncle told himself the story he had heard as a little boy, how Kuloskap had abandoned the world because of the evil in it. He made a great feast to say good-by, then he paddled off in his great canoe. Now he lives in a splendid long house, making arrows. When the cabin is filled with them he will make war on all mankind.
38
Is All The World A Prayer To Some Star? Are All The Years Of The World A Catalogue Of The Events Of Some Holiday? Do All Things Happen At Once? Is There A Needle In The Haystack? Do We Perform In The Twilight Before A Vast Theater Of Empty Stone Benches? Do We Hold Hands With Our Grandfathers? Are They Warm And Royal, The Rags Of Death? Are All The People Living At This Very Second Fingerprinted? Is Beauty The Pulley? How Are The Dead Received In The Expanding Army? Is It True That There Are No Wallflowers At The Dance? May I Suck Cunts For My Gift? May I Love The Forms Of Girls Instead Of Licking Labels? May I Die A Little At The Uncovering Of Unfamiliar Breasts? May I Raise A Path Of Goosepimples With My Tongue? May I Hug My Friend Instead Of Working? Are Sailors Naturally Religious? May I Squeeze A Golden-Haired Thigh Between My Legs And Feel Blood Flowing And Hear The Holy Tick Of The Fainting Clock? May I See If Someone Is Alive By Gobbling His Come? Could It Be Recorded
