by Abby Smith
Pettikin
Abby Smith
Copyright © 2016 Abby Smith
All rights reserved. No part of this book, except in the case of brief quotations, may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher. For information contact Softlight Press LLC, P.O. Box 242, Wilton, CT 06897 or visit www.pettikin.com
"The Waking," copyright © 1945 by Theodore Roethke; from COLLECTED POEMS by Theodore Roethke. Used by permission of Doubleday, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. Any third party use of this material, outside of this publication, is prohibited. Interested parties must apply directly to Penguin Random House LLC for permission. Used by permission of Faber & Faber Ltd for print in the UK and Commonwealth excluding Canada.
Excerpts from "Kabir: Ecstatic Poems" by Robert Bly Copyright © 2004 by Robert Bly
Reprinted by permission of Beacon Press, Boston.
Cover art and design by Sophie Mitchell
(www.sophiemitchellillustrations.com)
ISBN: 0-9983623-1-X
ISBN-13: 978-0-9983623-1-1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2016919673
Softlight Press LLC
Wilton, CT 06897
This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, to real people, living or dead; or to real locales or products are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and their resemblance, if any, to real-life counterparts is entirely coincidental.
The moon bird's head is filled with nothing but thoughts of the moon,
and when the next rain will come is all that the rain bird thinks of.
Who is it we spend our entire life loving?
—Kabir
1
Aunt May’s funeral was about as strange as Aunt May had been.
There were ten of us there, if you didn’t count the alpacas. We had just arrived at the cemetery and were arranging ourselves on either side of the grave. Mom and I ended up on one side with five people from town I didn’t know very well. I assumed they were there more from a sense of civic duty than any genuine affection for my eccentric great-aunt.
Aunt May’s friends were on the other side of the grave.
They had arrived from out of town that morning, two men and a woman. The first man wasn’t very tall but seemed big somehow—stout and with a broad chest like a lumberjack. He introduced himself to us as Theodore Theopolous the Professor, but failed to specify professor of what. The second man was tall but seemed small somehow—thin and gaunt, with mousy hair and a beard that looked like it had been eaten by moths over the winter. His name was Bob, and he insisted on bringing the alpacas. The woman, Mrs. Widgit, was short with a mop of gray curls and squinty eyes. She wore a long green dress with purple flowers and twirled next to the grave. They each held one of Aunt May’s three alpacas and seemed oblivious that the people next to me were staring at them and whispering.
Well, it didn't take much to cause a stir in Wooster, Ohio. In my fourteen years I had already been a subject of gossip for the people in this small town more than once. I wondered if they included me in their whispers—if they thought I was standing on the wrong side of the grave.
The cemetery in Wooster covers most of the western side of the hill on Madison Avenue, out on the southern end of the town. It looks like a park but feels ominous, with gravestones tucked behind a black wrought iron fence, a row of towering spruce trees guarding the back perimeter like sentinels. On the slope next to the entrance, two rows of hedges are carved into a crooked welcome: WOOSTER CEMETERY.
A gated community for dead people.
Aunt May's grave was about a quarter-mile down a winding, blacktopped path from the main entrance, underneath a sprawling maple tree. There, we were tucked away from the road and, thankfully, the view of passing cars.
It was too warm for October, and I could feel prickles of heat forming underneath my wool dress. I knew that morning I would be too hot in it, but it was the only thing I owned that was black. In fact, it was my only dress.
Mom twisted her watch on her wrist with an almost imperceptible movement, her short, red curls gleaming in the sun.
“Your father’s late,” she murmured.
Dad was the minister of the local Presbyterian church and would perform the service. It wasn’t like him not to be on time.
From across the grave, the alpacas shifted their feet and made soft, staccato honking noises. Aunt May had always said it was called humming, but to me it sounded like honking. Maybe they were too warm, as well. Bob had dressed them in colorful Guatemalan woven blankets and matching ski hats with long tassels that dangled down the sides of their faces. Because, I suppose, it wouldn’t have been weird enough to just bring plain alpacas to a funeral.
I squinted through the sun at Professor Theopolous. If the alpacas and I were too warm, he must have been sweltering. The fabric of his faded pinstriped suit was as thick as cardboard, and he wore a cream-colored, wool fisherman's sweater underneath. He had just a monk’s fringe of dark hair that morphed directly into a beard, a gold-framed monocle over his left eye, and a deathly solemn expression. I don’t think he moved since we got there.
Mrs. Widgit, on the other hand, hadn’t stopped moving. She was a little heavy, and it was obvious now as she leaned forward, balancing herself on one leg, that her giant chest was unrestricted by a bra. She pulled herself upright and bent her right knee, pressing the sole of a worn Birkenstock sandal into her left calf. She clasped her hands in front of her in prayer position, and then swung them out to her sides, like a giant bird about to take flight.
I stared at her. I was sure she was Aunt May's friend, and yet she bounced around as if the funeral were cause for celebration instead of mourning. Meanwhile, the people next to me wore black and feigned sympathy, but wouldn't give Aunt May a second thought once they left the cemetery, unless it was to gossip about the strange behavior of her friends.
Didn't anyone there feel the way you were supposed to feel when somebody died?
As soon as I thought it, Mrs. Widgit’s head snapped toward me, dark eyes boring into mine. I dropped my gaze quickly, my cheeks flaming.
Because if anyone did feel that way, I knew it wasn’t me.
A few tears came to my eyes, but I wasn’t really sure why. I knew it wasn’t because Aunt May died, and that made me feel worse. It seemed like if you were at someone’s funeral, you should be sad about their death. But rather than sad, I was more uneasy, the way I get when the main character in a horror movie is about to go down into the basement alone.
It’s not that I didn’t love Aunt May. I spent most of my afternoons as a child with her while my parents were at work, and we always got along fine. I hadn’t seen as much of her recently, though, not since I was old enough to be on my own after school. The news of her death surprised me, but only left me cold and numb.
Mom nudged me, interrupting my reverie. She had PhDs in both math and psychology and, with her own private therapy practice in town, was the main breadwinner in our family. I was sure she would have some psychological explanation for what I was or wasn’t feeling, so I vowed not to tell her. I didn’t want to know what kind of crazy I was.
She pointed up the hill. “Your dad’s finally here.”
Dad walked down the path from the entrance. Instead of his minister’s robe, he wore a faded pair of jeans and a T-shirt with a large portrait of Aunt May on the front. Two young guys I didn’t recognize followed him, carrying a large black tru
nk with brass handles between them.
“What’s going on?” I whispered. Dad hadn’t warned me about this.
“I have no idea.” Mom wore that look I always thought of as her Psychologist Face—not showing any surprise or emotion no matter what bizarre human behavior she encountered.
Dad smiled briefly at us but didn’t hesitate. He walked to the other side of the grave and gestured for the two young men to place the trunk at the base of the maple tree. They did so and left.
Well, of course Dad would be on Aunt May’s side. Aunt May was my mother’s aunt, but Dad was her closest friend and supporter all these years.
When Aunt May decided to buy the alpacas, Dad spent every weekend for the better part of a year fencing in a paddock behind the cottage that she rented from us, on the back of our forty-acre farm. When Aunt May painted the cottage fluorescent green and the shutters pink, Dad calmed Mom down and then, somehow, persuaded Aunt May to stick to a more reasonable palette when she repainted the cottage (which was often). Dad arranged for me to spend my afternoons after school with her, from the time I was five until I was eleven. I remember standing on a stool next to her kitchen counter, my long blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, baking cookies. I mixed the wet and dry ingredients in a large bowl while Aunt May told me stories about gnomes and dragons and far-off worlds. Original stories, though, not the stuff you heard in school.
When Aunt May sent me home with a bag of cookies, Dad ate them with me, destroying the evidence before Mom got home.
Dad turned away from us and huddled together with the strangers at the gravesite. The back of his T-shirt said “Ask me about the bet I lost with Aunt May.”
The people from town muttered to each other.
I leaned toward Mom. “What bet?”
“I have no idea,” Mom said again. Her Psychologist Face morphed into her Slightly-Annoyed-Spouse face.
Dad opened the lid on the trunk under the maple tree. He distributed colorful Guatemalan ponchos and hats to the strangers, exactly like the ones the alpacas were wearing. They took turns holding the alpacas while putting the costumes over their clothes. Dad did the same with a fourth costume and then pulled a large manila envelope from the trunk.
Once they all looked equally ridiculous, Aunt May’s friends rearranged themselves with the alpacas, and my dad stepped in front of them, facing us. He was medium height and medium build, or dad-shaped as my friend Andie called it, with thinning brown hair and a neat beard. Our eyes met.
We are never going to hear the end of this, I thought at him.
He averted his gaze and adjusted his poncho. The murmuring died down, I assume because people were too stunned to talk.
“Friends, welcome,” Dad said. “I guess it’s fairly obvious that we’ll be doing things a little...differently today.”
A relieved chuckle swelled up from the crowd.
“You probably won’t be surprised to learn that Aunt May prepared her own words for me to read to you today. She strictly forbade me, of course, to make any religious remarks on this occasion.”
Soft laughter at that.
“However…” Dad became wistful. “Since this is the one time May will not be able to stop me, I wanted to say that she was a dear friend, and I loved her. She will be missed. And I know that in the eyes of our Creator, she was indeed a creation to behold. A real force of nature. And while I, personally, will miss her, I also believe that we pass her into good hands today.”
A stillness seemed to wash over the group as Dad spoke. He had that effect on people, projecting strength and gentleness at the same time, even in such an outlandish getup. I suppose that’s why he was a good minister. You felt somehow consoled when you listened to him, even if you weren’t sure you understood or believed what he was saying.
“Now….” Dad held up the envelope. “We’ll see what May has to say for herself.” He slid a finger under the seal.
Mrs. Widgit bounced on her heels.
“I haven’t actually read this,” Dad said, a little nervously I thought, as he removed a sheet of paper. He scanned it quickly and read:
“Hello my dear friends and relatives, and the rest of you who have shown up for your own reasons.” He threw a quick, apologetic glance at the townies. “If you are hearing this, then I am dead, and you are hearing it from my nephew-in-law Dan, who has lost his bet with me. Make sure to ask him about it on your way out.” A grim look passed over my father’s face, fading as he continued.
“We really make too much of death here on Earth. Trust me, it’s not worth getting so upset about. It’s all an illusion, you see. Nothing and no one we think we have is ever ours to begin with. Everything here is just on loan to us for a short time, and when we leave, we leave everything behind.”
I suddenly felt much colder, as if the temperature had dropped ten degrees, even though the sun still shone as brightly as before. I folded my arms across my stomach.
“Today I must go, but there is one last thing I would like to leave behind. A poem--”
Dad broke off and looked up at me, surprised.
“A poem, which I dedicate to my great-niece, Allie.”
Everyone turned toward me. Mrs. Widgit and Bob were smiling, but Professor Theopolous scowled, like I had done something wrong. I suddenly wished I could hop down into the grave next to Aunt May.
Dad read:
The Waking, by Theodore Roethke.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.
We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.
Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me, so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.
This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.
He turned the paper over, but there was nothing on the other side.
“That’s it,” he said, folding the paper in half. He grabbed a handful of the dirt piled next to the grave and threw it onto Aunt May’s coffin.
“Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” he murmured, almost to himself. “Bye, May.”
I tucked my icy hands under my arms. What did that poem mean? Why did Aunt May want me, of all people, to hear it?
The people next to me stirred, talking softly. They started walking toward Mom and me to pay their respects when a loud voice called out from across the grave, “OK, it’s time! Let’s begin!”
Everyone turned to watch.
Mrs. Widgit was in charge. “Bob, hold the alpacas! Theo, help me over here. Dan! We need you!”
Bob took the alpaca ropes as a bustling Mrs. Widgit herded Professor Theopolous and Dad over to the trunk.
They pulled out three conical objects—wooden pipes, about four feet long, an inch and a half in diameter at one end, flaring to three inches at the bottom. They were painted blue and stenciled with white moons, yellow stars and red flowers. I assumed they were musical instruments, but there were no keys or reeds.
Dad and the strangers rearranged themselves in front of Aunt May’s grave with Dad in the middle, the professor and Mrs. Widgit on either end, and Bob holding the increasingly distressed alpacas behind them.
They raised the pipes to their lips.
They can’t be serious, I thought. Could Dad even play an instrument?
Mrs. Widgit inh
aled dramatically, eyes wide, nodded her head once, and the three of them blew through the pipes, bugle-style.
It sounded like giant frogs dying. The noise coming from the pipes had no harmony or melody. They held the same notes for several seconds, inhaled, and played the same notes again, seeming unconcerned about whether they came in at the same time or not. Dad’s face turned red with exertion.
I choked back a giggle and glanced at Mom. She had one arm folded across her stomach, the other hand covering her mouth. She refused to look at me.
Dad returned his pipe to the trunk and hurried over to Bob, who handed him one of the alpaca’s leads. The professor and Mrs. Widgit kept playing. Dad and Bob began to weave around each other in a figure eight pattern, dragging the unwilling alpacas behind them. Dad’s lips moved as if he were trying to keep time or count his steps. I wondered, horrified, if anyone was filming this.
After what seemed like forever, Mrs. Widgit caught the professor’s eyes and, with a flourish of her pipe, ended the droning. Dad and Bob actually ran into each other at that point, mercifully concluding their dance, as well.
Everyone was silent. A car hissed by on the road.
Mrs. Widgit stretched her arms out wide, pipe dangling from her right hand, and beamed.
“This concludes our program today. Thank you all so very much for coming!”
After a pause, someone from town started clapping. A few others joined in, but seemed uncertain if they should be applauding at a funeral, so the resulting sound was almost as pathetic as the music had been, and died off quickly.
The murmuring and shuffling started again.
“This is going to be all over the Internet by tomorrow,” I said to Mom.
Mom just raised her eyebrows and exhaled slowly. The townies converged on us.
“So sorry for your loss.”
“But what an...interesting ceremony.”
