What will they do when they find me gone? Come after me or forget about me? Not much to forget—one less silent black bundle, one empty pallet, one less trencher.
After supper I walk towards my hut as I’m supposed to, but I go right past, on up the hill where there’s my fallen tree. This time I bring a blanket.
Life has been given to each of us. Life at all is life enough.
Giving life. I think about a baby. There’s still time to change my mind. I can go back down, but I fall asleep and don’t.
Let us lie at night as empty of desire and hope and terror as in the daylight of our lives. Let our dreams be neither sweet nor fearful. Never the cold sweat of the fear of death, nor, on the other hand, the hot sweat of desire.
As far as I can tell, I have not dreamt such dreams. Not even now.
I wake with the birds. I’m far enough away that I don’t hear the rooster down below. The little birds up here don’t say: Get up and get to work. They say: Listen. Look.
Either I haven’t been looking out beyond my bonnet for so long that I forgot what weather is like, or this morning is unusually beautiful. Fog—below, hiding the village, but not up here. Snowy peaks behind me, pink in the sunrise. It was fitting that it was eyes that set me off on this course.
About me not mating, how will they know? Are there conferences? How long will it take them to find out it didn’t happen? I’ll sneak back later and see what’s happening, but there’s plenty of time.
Time is our enemy. It leads to thoughts. Do not think.
I see why. I’m thinking all sorts of things and every single one of them I shouldn’t.
But I don’t know what I want. I only know what I don’t want. All our shoulds. All our promises. Our vows. Swearing to this and swearing to that. They don’t add up to any wants.
The city below, while called democratic and while people vote for their leaders, is full of poverty, drugs, murders, muggings, greed, spending… and spending to no purpose but to spend. Leave all that behind and come to us. Once and for all climb away from all those others and their self-congratulation—from their boasting of their rights of man.
Live as we do here.
Do I live? Did I live? Now, waking to the birds, watching the sunrise with nothing to do but watch…. My hand on my stomach feels the worn cloth of my tunic. Such softness—soft tunic on top of soft stomach. How have I not noticed that softness until now? Even with my promise not to? And how have I not noticed the tops of trees? And haven’t we had these same little birds down where we live? Don’t we have a stream?
Do not raise your right hand. Sit in a neutral position. Neither kneel nor prostrate yourself. Make a simple promise to do your duty. A promise in any position should be a promise as good as any other.
Give thanks that we have but little, and for what little we have. For shoes that hold. For a warm sweater. For a blanket. For firewood. Most of all for having been born at all and for this short time on earth.
Time is exactly what I have the most of. Yesterday I didn’t know how to use it. Now I pick berries. Nibble at spearmint. And the smell! I’m mostly used to kitchen smells. Now there’s a piney, tree smell.
We always bathe in big pans and in our (black) bathing dresses so as never to be naked. I take my clothes off and bathe in the stream. I look at myself. I wonder about my age. Am I too old? For yearning?
I’ve renewed my vows every first snow without wondering. I’ve promised over and over to be one of us, pure as mountain snow, and yet, even so, and though I’ve kept my eyes on the floorboards, I’ve noticed things: the knots in the wood, the different sizes of feet. I’ve thought I could tell male from female by the ankles. All this time I’ve appreciated life more than I should.
I was so young. Now I’m… a woman who doesn’t even know her age. Still of childbearing age or I’d not have been chosen. Though you’d think by now we’d all be a little old for childbearing. (Do they somehow keep track of those of us still menstruating? I suppose they do.) Maybe this is a last chance. A sudden decision by our leader. Perhaps some of us have died. How would we know? We’re kept from pain as well as joy.
No weeping no love no hate no sorrow…. Being here right now in a single moment. What can ever hurt? We have done away with yearning and desire. No one is eager for more of anything or for what they don’t have. There’s neither anger nor anxiety nor greed nor hope.
I am greedy. I want to see those eyes again. I want to see those long fingered battered hands. When I see them I’ll want to see them yet again… and again. They’re right, there’s no end to it.
I come back down for lunch and then hide and watch—the black bundles at their busyness. They don’t look up. Easy to hide. I can even do a job here and there and nobody knows. I head over to where the men work at men’s work. There I have to hide because of my bonnet. I wonder if I can find a hat somewhere. I watch from behind the lilacs.
The men are building a new outhouse. It will have four sections. Two for men and two for women.
A black figure in a black bonnet comes with water. They stop to drink. They take their hats off and put water on their hair. They pour it down the backs of their tunics. I leave my bonnet in my hiding place, sneak out and grab a hat. But one of the men isn’t watching his feet as he should. He sees me and grunts. It’s a grunt of surprise. They all look up.
Will they find out about all the forbidden things I’ve done? Will they see in my naked face that I fell in love with eyes? That I spent two days and nights doing nothing but listening and looking? Even that I bathed naked? And here’s my blue feather, right in front.
They don’t say anything, they just stare. Of course. How can a person talk after so much silence? Even I… and even after I practiced on the mountain…. Good that I did or I’d be as they are, but I can speak though it comes out too loud again. I say, “I speak. I have wished and hoped and felt yearning. I don’t deserve to be among you.”
I peer into faces. I look for gray-green eyes. For a beard with white streaks. But I embarrass them. They all look down again.
A single moment is calm. All single moments are peaceful. Time will hold still.
I see that this is true. There’s time to breathe. Time for the heart to beat. Time for a bird to sing. For a bumblebee to buzz. Leaves catch the breeze.
Here, in this long, long, long moment, I think I can move about as I wish. Run away. Nobody will see. But one man is watching. Is he our leader? Or one of our leaders? I’ve no idea how many there might be.
He’s memorizing me. I think about my face. I seem to remember I used to have a birthmark on my cheek. That’ll be easy for him to remember.
His eyes are not green-grey.
He comes towards me. Nobody else moves. They’re all still looking down. They don’t want to see what might happen. It might lead to pain and thoughts.
I see his clenched teeth. He’s reaching as though to grab my throat.
I grab the nearest tool. It’s a saw. All I do is hold it out, the rough edge facing him. He runs right into it. His tunic sleeves hook on it. There’s blood on his arms. Even so he keeps coming, pushing his arms yet farther into the saw. Blood pours out. That stops him. The others look. They see a hurtful thing. They’ve tried all this time to avoid just such as this.
Keep each other safe. You are each other’s keepers. Do no harm.
I didn’t mean to. But he looked so angry.
They all go to help the man. I pick up the hat and put it on. It’s too big, but all the better. I run.
Nobody follows. After a minute I walk at the usual pace, as if busy. I’m as good as invisible. I loop back to see what happened to the man. I hope I didn’t kill him. All I did was stand there. He did it to himself, coming after me like that.
The other men are binding his cuts. I didn’t kill. At least that.
There’s a nursing hut for accidents or sick people (though out here in the wilds we have hardly any flu or colds). I stayed there when I broke my ankle. Four me
n carry him there. Others go back to work on the outhouse. I follow with the men but I stay well back.
The lunch bell clangs.
We all go except the four men at the nursing hut and the hurt man.
Later there’s a message on the nursing hut door. It says what has been said before.
Life is dangerous and deadly. Unforeseen things will happen, but know that all is well until a later time when all that is, will end, even in the very next moment.
I go back to work with the men. It’s much more interesting than women’s work. Perhaps because it’s different. And then you get taken care of. People bring water and later in the afternoon, women come with a snack.
There are new things to like. The smell of fresh cut wood.
Once I admit it to myself, I did enjoy things. The floor boards, the earth and its weeds, the gruel, the smell of rain. I didn’t mean to. It’s as if one has a need to enjoy whatever there is to enjoy.
I don’t know if I’ll get to see those eyes again or not but I’m watching for them and I’m happy.
Focus. There is no moment but this empty moment right now. This moment is enough. It is all you have.
Such a full moment. Man sweat. We don’t smell like that. They could find me out by sweat alone. And I keep looking out at everybody.
In the evening after work, the men go down to the river to bathe. I go back and pick up my bonnet from behind the lilacs and put it in a safer spot. With both a hat and a bonnet I’ll have more freedom than ever before.
All are equal here, and all equally neutral. All neither happy nor unhappy. Our minds are on what’s in front of us. Purity. Harmony. Utility. The only proper life.
At supper the men are looking. Not out the window but at us. They know one of us did it. I make a small slight man, lost in my too-big man’s hat. I should have kept my bonnet. And I never took off my feather. Luminous blue. It must be like a beacon.
But only that angry man really saw my face. The others weren’t watching when he came after me. They didn’t see that he did it to himself. They only saw the blood afterwards. Maybe they think I lashed out at him on purpose.
Do they discuss things? Or do they just know what to do? As: find the woman in a man’s hat.
But I see him. I see the hands first and then I look up into the eyes. He’s looking right at me. He knows.
Love will make you want to please the beloved. Love will make you want to know the name of the beloved and where the beloved came from.
Above our village I saw beavers mating. I saw birds, the same. They say we mustn’t think the word “love.” We are not to think more of one of us than of another, anymore than we should value one thing more than another, as why love one spoon better than another spoon.
But it is known though nothing is ever said about it, that one does fall in love even with spoons and cups. Has one’s favorites even from among one’s socks.
But now… right now, if my eyes could speak out without saying a word. If I could…. If my eyes could speak….
(Come with me. Up into the mountains. We’ll have our own wild mountain children. We’ll have each other. Or come with me, even down into the evil of the town. Surely there’s a place for us somewhere.)
He looks. His eyes give messages I can’t fathom. I can no more guess what my eyes might be saying to him than I can guess at his to me. Mine must be full of yearning.
He looks down and begins to eat. They all do, as if his eating is a signal. Perhaps the signal that I have been found.
Is he our leader? Did I fall in love with exactly the worst one? Or best?
Is escape possible? I stand up and step off the bench, kicking my neighbors in my haste. All those in men’s hats get up, too. All those in bonnets sit but stop eating.
There’s no sense in running with all those men ready to chase me. I will speak instead of running. I stand up on the bench. That surprises them.
I don’t know how I got the courage… except that everything is lost anyway.
What I want to say is, I didn’t mean to hurt, but….
Words have never made anyone understand anything. Words obfuscate. Confuse. Conceal. Form alibis that sound reasonable, but are just excuses.
I don’t suppose my reasons… my alibi will sound plausible … that I didn’t mean to do it. Everyone would say that. If I’m going to use words they’ll have to be something different.
“Because I love,” I say.
I’m trembling. My voice is shaky.
“Because I love. Because I look out the window and watch the bushes in the breeze. Because I have a feather. Because I watch the birds. Let me go. I’ll do my loving someplace else. I confess I’ve always loved. Even from the beginning. I loved the small bone spoon. I loved the china cup. The apples. Even the beans. Even so, I obeyed.”
Everyone watches. They’ve never seen anything like it… like me. Like doing this. They’re too stunned to move. If I had run they’d have known what to do. I feel safe as long as I can keep talking. Though I suppose that’s not really true. They’ll tire of talk.
Then I find myself making excuses. I say, “He ran towards me with his hands out. I was scared. I held out the first thing I could grab. I would never harm another creature. I never have. He looked as if he was going to choke me.”
I say, “But I know there are no excuses. I know I am his keeper.”
Where does all this talk come from? As if I’d been waiting all these years for just this chance. My voice is more powerful every minute. I’ve stopped trembling.
I say. “I see that one must see.” I wave my arms. I must look as if I’m trying to fly. I say, “There are important things to see.”
All eyes are on me.
“Eyes for instance. Are they not worth seeing? Look at each other. At your eyes.”
But they don’t. They keep looking at me.
“Am I, then, so worth seeing that you stare. After all these years it’s only me you see. Look out the window. Your first view should be of clouds.”
And there are clouds. It’s as if I’ve called them forth, but everybody still looks at me.
He also. His hands still hold his tin cup. His have got to be musician’s hands though there’s never any music here.
“I’ve had enough of feet and floors. I speak. Why not? I look up. I look out the window. I see the lilacs blowing even now.”
We are not put on this earth to enjoy. Neither are we put here to feel pain and loss. We renounce them both so as to live empty of all feelings. We learn to control these impulses so as to see the world calmly.
But why are we here?
I say it, “Why are we here?”
I stop talking and wait. They wait, too. Nobody knows what to do.
Before, when someone broke, it was with screaming and crying. That person would be carried off. Nobody knows what happens afterwards. I didn’t anyway, though somebody must. But my case is different. I didn’t break, I just fell in love. I just began to pay attention.
Then that man … the very one … comes to me. Holds out his hand to help me from the bench. I take it. It’s rough from hard work but warm. I’m holding the long fingers. I can feel his strength.
I step down. I’ll do whatever he thinks best.
He leads me away. Perhaps to where they put the people who go crazy. Now I’ll find out.
It’s just the two of us.
“You looked at me. Remember? After that I began to see.”
He says, “We are not put on this earth to enjoy. Nor are we put here to feel pain and loss.”
“I want a moment of pleasure. Just a moment of it.”
“And after that there’s nothing but pain and loss.”
“I don’t mean a great joy. I mean a moment with both of us, you and I, up the hill, both of us looking out over the valley. Is that too much to ask?”
“All pleasure ties one to this world so that leaving it is a calamity. We live here empty of desire.”
“I thought, from your e
yes, that you’d be different.”
“Do not think.”
“But your face…. It’s kind.”
“Give thanks that we have but little.”
He takes me to the man I hurt. His hands and arms are bandaged. He’s resting quietly until he sees me. Then he looks as if he’d like to try and grab me by the neck again.
My man says, “Life at all is life enough.”
I’m wondering which of us he’s thinking of. Clearly this man will not die.
“What will happen? To me? Does one have one last wish?”
He begins to lead me up beyond the paths. Where in the world are we going? But I’m happy. How could I not be, I’m beside him, and I’m walking away from the village.
He can see how I feel. He says, “Avoid joy or nothing will ever be enough.”
The spot where he takes me is hard to get to. Part of the way it’s a scary path on the side of a cliff. He has me go first while he holds the back of my pants to keep me safe.
Beyond the cliff there’s a good view. We sit under a tree. His tree. He headed right for it.
We look out. The view is better than the one from my tree. You can see our whole village.
“You also. You haven’t kept your vows. You shouldn’t bring me here.”
I unpin my feather. I want to give it to him but I see a warning in his eyes. He won’t take it. I put it on the ground. I say, “There’s plenty more if one is willing to look.”
We sit.
“How good it is to look,” I say.
We sit.
I ask again. “What will happen? To me?”
We sit.
“I know we can’t have those like me in the village. I will remind people of exactly what they don’t want to be reminded of. And I hurt one of us. What will the punishment be?”
“We all die.”
Is that a clue to what will happen?
“You could leave me here in the mountains.”
He turns and looks at me, eye to eye just like that first time. We stare as we did. Again I wonder, how does one read someone else’s stare?
I Live With You Page 13
