Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category
Hermione’s Farewell
Friday, April 10th, 2009
We buried her with a mirror pressed tight against her face, wrapped in place by a scarf.
She had been a queen of two empires. She deserved respect. I painted her face: white lead mixed with gold dust so she would forever be golden. I rimmed her eyes with kohl, then drew the red suns upon her cheeks and chin, so the gods would recognise her when she came before them and know she was one of their own.
Long ago, when she returned to us, she was still beautiful. I knew her by sight, but my own mother had to ask my father who I was. Menelaus himself barely knew. All his attention had been spent chasing her, intent upon dragging her back.
When I was young enough to want her love she was an indifferent mother. Later, she was merely dismissive, assured that I was not as beautiful as she was, that no man would launch a war in pursuit of my hand.
Thus I stayed in the shadows, walking quietly so my footfalls did not disturb the gods. My life was overshadowed not just by her loveliness but by its very legend. I hated her, quietly as I did everything, but hated nonetheless.
At last she became ill, felled perhaps by an ill-chosen dish. I sat by her bedside, dutiful and silent, watching for any sign she might recover. My cousin Orestes had arrived. We had been friends from childhood, and in truth I’d held him in my heart for a long time. But even he watched her, aunt though she was, and she glowed under his attention.
She was glorious still, though weak; inside she was old. A cushion over her face was all it took.
I tended her body, pressing the mirror to her face so she would see only herself. So she would not try to leave her body and walk the world once more. So she would not feel alone. Part witch, part goddess – what ordinary grave could hold her? Who thought bright Helen would ever be left in darkness.
As I prepare, now, for my wedding to Orestes, I’m tormented by one thought: no matter that she is gone, she is still in memory. Will always be in memory, mine, Orestes’, the world’s.
The Patron Saint of Spring
Thursday, April 9th, 2009
Blossom covers the courtyard like snow, knee-high. The four trees cluster so closely together and their branches have grown so numerous, and the courtyard is so small, that the petals have nowhere else to fall.
The walls on either side are crumbling. The cherry trees grow without any person to witness them.
A folktale current in the land fifty miles south of the courtyard with the cherry trees tells of a woman who wandered the deserted northern countryside two hundred years ago. It goes like this:
She wore snowdrops, crocuses, daffodils and tulips in her hair, every day of her life. No one knew where she came from — no woman admitted to birthing or raising a child with her yellow eyes. On a cold midwinter’s day, she walked out of the woodland with her hair full of colour, with only a flimsy dress the colour of newly budded leaves covering her pale body.
At first the townsfolk did not trust her. Fey creatures lived in those woods — all sensible people knew that. Her unnatural eyes and the unseasonable flowers in her hair confirmed their suspicions.
One girl was not so fearful. When every door was barred shut to the strange woman, this girl held out a handful of stale bread.
They ate it together under an ice-limned tree.
By the time they finished the tiny meal, all the snow around the base of the tree had melted. The woman ran thin, pale fingers over the snow. It withered under her. The soil softened. A single snowdrop grew, unfurling its green stem like a swan raising its head.
Two men accused her of witchcraft. Another gently took her hand and led her to his shed where ice had ruined stores he feared to hold a torch near. An old woman led her to the lake so that a boy’s body could be brought above the ice for the proper rituals, and a younger woman showed her the earth to thaw so he could be buried.
Every step she took in the town brought snowdrops.
Crocuses followed, quicker than usual, and the first tiny daffodils as bright as her eyes.
It drained her. On the day a field of tulips flowered as red as fresh strawberry jam, she fell to the ground as cold as the snow she had melted. The townsfolk buried her in a separate courtyard on the edge of the church grounds.
The cherry trees that grew there never stopped blossoming.