The Man with the Compound Eyes

by Wu Ming-Yi

  Sometime later that night there was a strong earthquake, strong enough to reawaken people’s childhood memories. At first, she was still half-asleep; after all, she had been living in earthquake-prone Haven for quite a while now and had felt worse than this. But when the earth was still shaking over a minute later, and the tremor was getting stronger and stronger, Alice sat up in bed automatically, instinctively wanting to take shelter or flee the house. How ironic! Why should a person who is ready to die care how it happens? Alice lay back down and seemed to hear a great dull roaring coming from somewhere, as if the mountain itself was about to move. She recalled that huge earthquake that hit when she was in elementary school. No one in her family was killed, but her school had collapsed, and a science teacher who really liked her named Miss Lin as well as a boy who sat next to her in class, often gave her treats and wore spectacles had both been crushed to death. After school the day before, he had walked with her in the student procession and given her five silkworms. Five days after, maybe as a result of eating mulberry leaves that had not been cleaned properly, the silkworms all produced mushy black poops and died, their bodies all shriveled up. Those were the two most intimate memories she had of the event. An earthquake does not have to kill you to induce mortal terror; it is enough that it can take away something dear to you, leaving nothing but a shriveled skin behind.

  The rumbling sound lasted several minutes before the world fell silent again. Alice was so tired she fell right back to sleep. It was not yet light out when she awoke to the inexorable rhythm of the waves. She got up, looked out the window, and found herself standing on a remote island in the midst of an immense ocean, as frothy waves rolled relentlessly across the distance toward the shore.

  4. Atile’i’s Island

  The fog seemed to emanate from the ocean deep. It permeated everything, as all-pervasive as Kabang Himself. For a moment Atile’i wondered whether he was underwater. He might as well rest his oars, for what was the point of rowing in such a great fog? Seven days from Wayo Wayo, he was convinced that oars were useless in the open ocean. No wonder the islanders had established an invisible boundary around the fishing grounds, for any man who crossed it might never return. Not to mention the fact that his provisions of food and fresh water had run out. Though in spirit he had given up hope that his fate would be any different from any other second son, he had not despaired in the flesh. That’s when he started trying to drink seawater.

  Near midnight it started to rain. The rain and the fog blurred the boundary between sea and sky. In the rain Atile’i assumed he had gone through the Sea Gate. Legend had it that at the extremity of rain and fog there was a gate in the sea, beyond which lay the True Isle, the abode of Kabang and all the other aquatic deities, the island of which Wayo Wayo was but a shadow. Usually this True Isle was hidden beneath the sea, only to rise above the waves at certain fateful hours.

  Atile’i sought shelter under the palm-leaf awning he had made especially for his talawaka, but it was dripping wet underneath, not much drier than out in the open. He murmured, “A mighty fish has fled, a mighty fish has fled.” In the Wayo Wayo language this meant: Forget it, forget it. Though he had not said it out loud, Atile’i had already blasphemed in his heart: when he wondered whether, out here on the ocean, the ocean was greater than God. How could any god rule the sea? The sea itself was God.

  At dawn, Atile’i realized his talawaka was sinking. Vainly but out of necessity, he bailed the water out, and only abandoned ship when it was almost submerged. Atile’i was a first-rate swimmer among the youth of Wayo Wayo, his legs as supple as a fishtail, his arms slicing through the water like fins, but in the open ocean even a jellyfish has more wherewithal than a man, even a man like Atile’i. Atile’i was swimming hard. No thoughts remained, not even the thought of quitting. Atile’i was like an ant that stumbles into a puddle and flails around, fighting for its life, knowing neither hope nor despair.

  Though he had sinned against Kabang in his mind, Atile’i still prayed to Him with the words of his mouth. “O Kabang,” he chanted, “the only one who could dry up the sea, if You would forsake me, please let my corpse turn into coral and drift homeward for Rasula to find.” Atile’i lost consciousness as soon as his prayer was complete.

  Atile’i woke to find that he was still floating at sea. He seemed to remember a dream, in which he had almost made it onto an island. On the edge of this island stood a group of youths with sad eyes, fins growing where arms should have been, and blotchy bodies, as if they had spent their whole lives rolling around on a reef. When Atile’i’s talawaka was upon them, a gray-haired youth addressed him, saying, “A little bluefin tuna told us just the other day that you would arrive and join our tribe.” The other youths started singing a mournful song, as if a wave of melancholy had just swept in. It was a song the islanders often sang when they went to sea, and Atile’i could not help singing along.

  If the ocean waves come on,

  We’ll block them with our song

  But if a storm begins to blow

  Alas, fair maiden, you must know

  That into tuna, we might grow

  That into tuna, we might grow

  Their youthful voices were like stars consoling the darkness, like mournful raindrops showering the sea. Then a one-eyed youth said, “Listen, his voice is different from ours. It’s different, like he’ll be beached on an island of his own.” At this a wave hit, Atile’i lost his balance and out of dreamland fell.

  After coming to his senses, Atile’i found he really was beached on an island. Apparently boundless, the island was made not of mud but of a multihued mishmash of strange stuff, and there was a weird smell hanging in the air. The sun was now out. The waves had taken all Atile’i’s garments and ornaments, leaving him almost naked, but what bothered him most was the loss of the bottle of kiki’a wine Rasula had given him. The thought of Rasula’s kiki’a wine made him very dry of the mouth. Thankfully, but bizarrely, he had not lost the “speaking flute,” which he had been clutching in his hand when he fell unconscious. This must be the afterlife, Atile’i thought. He walked all over the island, discovering that most parts of it were none too firm. Some spots were quite spongy, like traps. Sometimes you could sink to a depth of several grown men or so before rising up again.

  A round object caught Atile’i’s attention. If he turned it toward the sun it shone with a dazzling rainbow light, but if he held it toward himself, Atile’i saw a tawny, mottled, lacerated face. Could something so hard be made of water? he wondered. Otherwise how could it reflect my appearance?

  Atile’i soon discovered that there were many sorts of colored bags all over the island. They were different from the burlap bags of Wayo Wayo in that they could hold water, though with some of them the water whooshed out as soon as you picked them up, leaving mussels, sea stars and other odds and ends high and dry. There were bags like this on Wayo Wayo, too. The elders said the white man had left them behind, but the past few years you often found them floating in the sea as well. The islanders used them to hold water, and they were more resistant than rock to the ravages of time. He pried open a few of the mussels and ate them raw. He even tried drinking some of the water inside. It had a stench, but no doubt it was fresh. Atile’i was so grateful he almost started to cry. With water he could live.

  Atile’i kept exploring the island until noon. He found shrimp and fish wedged between various objects, scarfing things as he went along. Before he knew it, it was sunset. He had picked up lots of sodden, ripped articles, apparently of clothing, but everything was so soft, not at all like the woven hemp raiment he was accustomed to. Still, one seemed to be able to wear them once they were dry. He also discovered some bottles, which he started collecting because they were so buoyant and brightly colored. He assumed they might come in handy if he made a boat or something like that.

  “This must be the land of death, and who knows what one might need here?” He piled up the bottles and other curiosities and prayed that the sea
would not turn to rain, so that tomorrow the sun could lift the damp and dry everything out.

  When night really fell, Atile’i figured he must still be alive, because of an old saying about the netherworld: half the year the sun shines bright, and half the year is ruled by night. The rhythm of time on this island felt the same as on Wayo Wayo; it sure didn’t seem like half a year had passed. Night in the middle of the ocean was not total darkness, as people generally imagine. The starlight and moonlight would drop through the clouds, and wondrous glowing lights would suddenly appear, sometimes so blinding a person could not get any sleep. Entranced by the spectacle, Atile’i sat on the edge of the island and brooded over an uncertain future.

  When the moon started to get low in the sky, Atile’i had a feeling he was not alone. Suddenly, all around him, stood the youths who had appeared in his dream. Wearing enigmatic smiles, they observed him in his distress. Atile’i made the Wayo Wayoan gesture of goodwill, turning his palms up with his figures slightly curved. He was about to question them when a youth with a gash from his left shoulder to his abdomen pre-empted him, saying: “You guess right, we are spirits not men. All the spirits of the second sons of Wayo Wayo are here.”

  “You’ve been expecting me?”

  “Yes.”

  “I should have known this was the netherworld. Or is this Midway Isle?”

  “May the sea bless you. In all honesty, we don’t know where we are. We’ve been all over, but we never knew there was such an island. It drifted here not long ago,” said the gray-haired youth from the dream.

  “So, are you going to take me with you?”

  “No. We’re not angels of death. We’ve been waiting for you to join us, but since you’re still alive, all we can do for now is wait,” said the youth with the huge gash.

  “Even after they die, the second sons of Wayo Wayo can never leave the sea,” said the gray-haired youth, and the others all echoed their agreement.

  The spirits of the second sons were not lying: this was the first time they’d found this island. “Several days ago we agreed to meet over at Petrel Ridge and get ready to greet the next member of our company: you. That was the first time we noticed the edge of this floating island on which you’ve landed. The day of your leave-taking, we all hastened back to Wayo Wayo to hear the elders sing the psalm of farewell, praise Kabang’s wisdom and celebrate the island’s riches, your bravery and Rasula’s beauty. Every day, when we incarnate, transform into our sperm whale avatars at daybreak, we tagged alongside your boat, until it sank. You mustn’t blame us. We are the dead, the spirits of the second sons, duty-bound to observe what happens without offering help or doing harm. We never expected that you would show the strength of a fish, that you just would not die. We’ve followed you all this way, and we saw a current carry you onto this island,” said the gray-haired one, who seemed to be the leader.

  Another thickset youth with a toothless mouth like a yawning cavity added, “We saw right away how strange this island was, and guessed it might be a trap set by Kabang, or a trial.”

  “But then we noticed something else,” the gray-haired youth said.

  “What was that?”

  “That this island was moving. That it might float beyond the range of the spirits of Wayo Wayo.”

  “Beyond the range of the spirits of Wayo Wayo?”

  “That’s correct: there is an invisible line we cannot pass.”

  “You mean that if I’m still alive when this island crosses the line then you won’t stay by my side?”

  “May the sea bless you. If you die out there, your spirit will drift forlorn on an infinite sea.”

  “So I can only join you if I go and drown myself now?”

  “Don’t ever do that. Anyone from Wayo Wayo who commits suicide will turn into a jellyfish. Jellyfish can’t recognize one another. You don’t really want to become a jellyfish, do you?”

  Atile’i had no wish to become a jellyfish. But now the spirits of the second sons were out of ideas. They waited with Atile’i for dawn. Actually, to the spirits, dawn no longer had any meaning, it was merely the time when, at the first light of day, they would dive into the water and turn into sperm whales. At night, after regaining their ghostly forms, they would wander on the sea, singing, zoning out, waiting for the arrival of the next second son. The sperm whales into which the spirits transformed during the day were pretty much the same as actual sperm whales. The only difference was that the sperm whale avatars wept.

  Atile’i could only wait until the island silently crossed the borderline and left the spirits of the second sons behind at a speed that was hard to grasp and which neither wind nor rain, tide nor dream, could change. When thrice the moon and the sun had traded places, the spirits of the second sons could barely make out the edge of the island when they emerged above the surface. “Atile’i! Atile’i!” they shouted, but their shouts changed into flying fish, leaping over the water and plopping into the waves.

  “Now it’s just me.” It took Atile’i two alternations of sun and moon to face the fact that he would have to bestir himself to survive. He tried catching fish, collecting rainwater, and weaving warm clothes out of various things he found here and there on the island. But though he was an expert fisherman, Atile’i was no good at weaving. When he draped himself with the garments he’d pieced together, he looked like a gaudy bird.

  Several days after picking up a kind of flexible club, Atile’i had the bright idea of grinding one end into a point and attaching something else he’d found, which was also elastic. In doing so, he had made himself a spear gun. He used the same method to make himself a gawana. Made out of different materials, it was more resilient and springy than the ones on Wayo Wayo. There was also a kind of ball that was harder than the pit of a fruit but bouncy, which could be hurled out beyond a gawana’s striking distance at birds in flight. Atile’i learned the hurling stance for the ball from a book he had found. There were colorful pictures in the book, and finely printed “words.” (Though people on Wayo Wayo did not have writing, the Sea Sage and Earth Sage still had many “books.”) Inside the book he found a picture of a man with the same brown skin as himself. Atile’i thought his stance was perfect, and the man’s hurling hand was aglow.

  Evening was the best time to catch waterfowl and sea turtles with his custom gawana. At first he could only stun the turtles, yank out their heads and suck blood from their necks. Then one day he found a shiny knife on the other side of the island. It was the sharpest knife he had ever seen. (They only had stone knives on Wayo Wayo). With it, he could dine on turtle meat, which was like sea cucumber but firmer. Sometimes a turtle would keep flapping its flippers after he had sliced its abdomen open, as if it was still underwater.

  But later Atile’i saw there were actually lots of dead sea turtles around the island. When he butchered them, he often found indigestible objects in their stomachs. “Did the sea turtles die from eating a piece of the island?” Atile’i wondered. Except for the water he collected, he had better avoid ingesting anything on the island.

  When Atile’i started diving more often, he realized that “the island under the island” was even more immense than the island itself. It was almost like an underwater maze, “so big as to be another kind of sea.” Atile’i could not think of a better way to describe it. To him, anything big could be compared to the sea. The subaquatic flotsam was a tangled mess, but a large wave could disturb its ad hoc order. Given that the island was translucent and in a constant state of change, it was no wonder Atile’i tended to get a bit lost at first when he went diving. He tried to move anything that might come in handy up onto the island. In no time he had quite the collection. Some things were useful, others just interesting. Atile’i gathered things that were weird or captivating. It was the same on Wayo Wayo, where everyone collected shells to decorate the dawn-facing side of the house. At first Atile’i hung these fancy things on his own “decorative wall,” but as the sun rose from a different direction every day there
was no way to keep it facing the sun. The island seemed to be turning.

  A while later, Atile’i started to collect thin little boxes with pictures on them. The briny seawater had not yet rotted away some of the pictures, and you could see naked female bodies in them. The girls gazed at him so tenderly, exposing their pale white breasts the likes of which Atile’i had never seen before. It went without saying that Rasula was a match for any of them. She half resembled them, but the rest of her was of the island. Anyway, by this point the sight of any nude female body seemed sufficient to cause Atile’i’s penis to swell and incline him to kawalulu, which he did, thinking of Rasula. He often thought maybe this was a kind of love.

  Atile’i also collected “books.” He had seen “books” at the Earth Sage’s place, but they were few and far between, and had to be kept in transparent bags to keep them from getting ripped or rotten. The Earth Sage’s “books” were allegedly left behind by the white man. The Earth Sage said the white man called the marks in the books “writing.” The islanders did not have writing, nor did they think that the world had to be remembered in written form. They thought that life was a kind of resonance between story and song, and that was good enough for them.

  Atile’i considered anything with writing to be a book, no matter what symbols it contained, illustrated or not, a single page or a thick stack. The symbols varied from book to book, but there seemed to be a hidden pattern. Perhaps because he had no way of knowing who established the pattern or what its provenance was, Atile’i felt a strange reverence for those marks. There were a few things on the island Atile’i had no trouble understanding, like tree trunks, fish carcasses and stones, but most things came from a world outside of his experience and beyond his knowledge. The marks in the books were the most amazing thing he’d seen, though, because they clearly came in different varieties. Why had the white man, or some other kind of islander, created something that seemed so utterly useless? As he stared at those marks, his body felt hot. He noticed a slight trembling.