Blue Birds
Page 4
I think of the girl,
her wild eyes,
her peculiar manner,
that I have spoken
of her to no one.
She came to the woods
to find me.
Those words
she wanted me to hear.
What could they mean?
If Uncle were near,
I would trust him with this secret.
Not Mother,
preoccupied with the baby,
Father,
busy at the forge,
working to rebuild the village,
unloading freight from the ships.
Uncle Samuel always understood,
made time just for me.
KIMI
No good can come
from knowing her.
Before I work,
I hurry to the forest,
take her montoac
from beneath my skirts,
and leave it buried
under the leaves
heaped on the ground.
My people,
we’ve had too much
of the English.
I do not want
her montoac.
Alis
The older boys pass near us,
each one carrying armfuls of wood
gathered outside the village.
George grips his bundle
as the others stack theirs
in the far end of the square.
He tilts his head toward the little ones,
their dirt-streaked faces.
“Your work is easier than mine.”
“How are you certain?” I say.
“You stand here resting,
while I am busy.”
His grin is broken toothed.
“Busy resting in the sun.”
I cannot deny this.
Though it’s hotter than
I’ve ever known,
though the thick air can oppress,
London was all rush
from one building to the next
to escape the rain, the stench, the filth.
Never have I loved
the outside world as now.
This time I’m the one to smile.
“Do not tell,” I whisper.
“I like caring for them best
when they are sleeping.”
Though I do not say it,
inside me hope awakens.
Perhaps I’ve found a friend.
“Your secret’s safe with me,” he says.
KIMI
Hunting season
brought womanhood,
planting season
my ceremony.
Four mornings past
I first saw
the girl
with water eyes.
KIMI
If Alawa had lived,
she would have given
the necklace at my ceremony—
after the pain
of the tattooing,
after I emerged
a woman
she would have fastened it
around my neck,
while voices lifted in celebration.
The skin of my arms and legs
is no longer tender,
but I have changed little.
If my sister were with me,
I would speak of this,
I would tell her
though I am now a woman
I do not yet feel grown.
But she is not here.
And I stay silent.
I do not confide
in the women, who saw
their thirteenth planting seasons long ago,
the small ones, who play
about the corn.
Mother has her sisters.
Wanchese has his men.
With Alawa gone,
there is no one else like me.
I have no one.
KIMI
The wooden bird.
I’ve stayed far from the place I left it,
and yet it calls,
as though it were a living thing.
All day I listen to it,
first in the fields,
while at the stream,
later as I pound the corn,
after an evening bowl of fish,
its music hasn’t ended.
It says
come back for me.
I will not.
KIMI
My sleep is restless.
Darkness stretches too long.
The sun is slow to trace the heavens.
When at last
morning comes,
I put my mind
to working in the fields.
Yet I cannot escape.
The bird still calls to me.
I work until
my nails are ragged.
Dirt cakes my hands.
Mother motions to me,
gives me a sip of water.
She holds a hand to my cheek,
cool and gentle.
“Kimi, are you well?”
“Yes,” I say.
But I do not believe it,
and neither does she.
“Bathe early,” she tells me.
“Rest until mealtime.”
I lie back in the water.
Currents swirl my hair about me.
Above, the sun journeys
closer to the earth.
Last time I saw the girl
I did what was needed,
told her
the English don’t belong.
Why then does her bird
still beckon me?
If I claim it,
do I betray Wingina?
If I keep it,
do I forget Alawa?
The sun escapes the sky,
and the moon settles in its place.
I go,
kneel beside the mound of leaves,
brush away their covering.
Again the bird is
tucked in the folds of my skirt.
It has grown silent
at last.
KIMI
Those about me sleep
in the stillness of the longhouse.
My thoughts are full awake.
I clasp the wooden bird,
run my thumb over its head.
Under its chin
its feathers are roughened,
its belly smooth.
Now that it is near,
it has not made a sound.
I do not understand its montoac,
but this is clear to me:
I was never meant to leave the bird.
It is the girl’s,
but somehow I, too, am joined to it.
The silence speaks this plainly.
Alis
Five days I’ve stayed back from the forest.
I’ve been busy with the children,
unsure what to make of the Indian girl.
Now the boys are with their mothers.
The afternoon is mine.
Enchantment pulls me deeper
through scattered branches,
beyond the slender saplings,
this chance to wander on my own,
discover nature’s secrets
I’ve only known
through Uncle, when he spoke
of the Governor’s paintings.
Now I can live this wild world.
Farther in,
I make my way,
don’t let myself admit
exactly where I’m heading
until I’m here,
the place I’ve met her twice before.
What is it like
to make a home
in such surroundings?
To be born
to this wonder?
She knows.
Alis
I can’t believe
she’s here,
waiting for me.
This time I will show her
I am just as brave
as she is.
If she speaks,
I will not run,
but listen,
make meaning
from her sounds.
Without thinking,
I lift my hand—
a foolish gesture—
such greetings
are for friends,
not strangers,
and even so,
she wouldn’t understand.
KIMI
She raises
her hand
at my approach.
There is kindness in it.
This is how
she speaks
to me.
KIMI
The Englishmen
in Wingina’s time
started as our friends.
Now we are enemies.
But the girl has
not chosen
to stay away
and neither
have I.
Alis
KIMI
I could not imagine going about
with my chest bare.
Never would I allow
others to ink my arms and legs.
Yet she is beautiful.
I would not wander unaware
as she does, unprotected,
loud and stumbling
through a forest
she doesn’t know.
Yet she is daring.
Alis
I stay
long enough to study
the patterns on her arms,
close enough
to meet her eyes
with no urge to lower my gaze.
We are not together,
but neither are we apart.
Three times
I have come here.
Three times
we have met.
Something
fascinating, fragile
grows between us.
KIMI
Alis
Her bird rests
in the folds of my skirt.
It has called her.
It has led me here.
I inch my hand forward,
let it hover over
the inky band about her arm.
She reaches near,
reminds me how Alawa,
entranced with a lizard,
longed to grasp
his glistening blue tail.
I touch the lacy pattern.
She presses a finger to my arm,
pulls her hand back quickly.
Her eyes rush to mine.
Did I expect her skin
to feel like wood or stone?
It is as any person’s would be.
Suddenly, I smile.
I begin to laugh.
Alis
I pass into the settlement unnoticed.
Where there was activity,
now no one is about.
My insides grow cold and heavy.
I am desperate to find my family.
I stumble over abandoned tools,
skirt a basket of laundry and an overturned bench.
Everyone’s assembled in the square.
To one side,
bald Mr. Pratt holds George,
who hangs like a marionette
with severed strings.
I push into the crowd.
Several women step back,
their faces covered.
I shove into the center,
where Father,
Mr. Dare,
Governor White,
Mr. Archard
hold the limbs of a man
whose back
is riddled with arrows,
whose head
is smashed in.
“Away, Alis!” Father says.
Tears etch his weathered cheeks.
I stagger out of the circle
past George
now crumpled on the ground,
and retch,
body heaving,
my hands pressed to my knees.
Above the clamor the Governor speaks.
“We found Mr. Howe near the shore,”
his voice breaks,
“as you see him.”
The bones
the arrows
fifteen missing men—
I retch again—
Dear Uncle Samuel!
What awful things
happened here
before we came?
What
is
this
place?
KIMI
Not long after I return,
Wanchese and his men come.
They’ve slain an Englishman
wandering alone,
hunting crabs with a clumsy weapon.
The English have again been shown
the might of the Roanoke,
they have again been reminded
of the wrong in beheading our weroance,
in unleashing disease and crippling our people.
In the season of the highest sun,
after those that survived Wanchese’s fire
broke free and fled,
my people celebrated.
Never again would we face
the betrayal of the English.
Yet here they are
with families,
and Manteo,
who never returned to the Croatoan,
but claimed the English as his own.
None is welcome here.
But there is a girl among them
I would have never known
if they had not come again.
One whose curiosity
reminds me of my sister,
one I long to understand.
Alis
The next morning I awake.
My head pounds with remembrance:
the crowd gathered in horror
around Mr. Howe.
Just one week here,
and one of us is dead,
attacked,
while I was with the girl.
He at the shoreline,
we in the woods,
was it luck he was the one
discovered?
Did she know
what was planned?
Out there,
was I in as much danger
as a murdered man?
None of us has done wrong,
yet we fear for our lives.
Alis
though it’s not enough to satisfy.
What little food we have must last
as long as we can make it.
I shuffle to Mr. Viccars’s house
to collect young Ambrose.
He clings to my sleeve
as I greet Mrs. Archard at her door.
“Remember,
they’re not to dump dirt on their heads,” she says,
her sharp eyes narrowed.
“It won’t happen again.”
I doubt Mrs. Archard
has ever had a bit of fun.
All the day
I roll a rag ball,
wipe dripping noses,
keep hands from the fire,
fetch back Tommy
when he wanders too close to the water pail,
teach them what Joan and I used to sing:
Summer is a-coming in
Loudly sing cuckoo
Groweth seed and bloweth mead
and springs the wood anew
Sing cuckoo!
It almost helps me to forget
that just this morning
the Governor and several of his men
sailed to the island Croatoan
in search of answers.
Manteo’s mother,
leader of the Croatoan,
will help us, the Governor says.
He’ll find the missing soldiers,
bring them back to Roanoke.
I roll the rag ball
for the hundredth time.
How can the Governor be sure of anything?
Alis
I leave the children with their mothers.