Who Will Lead Us

 

                       (“He has no breath,” said Lope, with finality. Her grief, displayed before her children, was profound, and terrifying to them.
            He lay still, he who had never lain still since his wriggling birth. Indeed, he neither took air, nor gave it back. He lay perfect and still. Grey he was. His massive chest so quiet.
            The wind blew long and low and black. Hard rain spattered the family.
            The young gathered around him with hollow hearts. Tails low, they trembled before him, two now fatherless.
            “Woe! Oh woe! Oh!” sang Gnaw, he who was least, and weakest. Lope looked upon her least son with empty eyes. No. Not that one. A fine singer. No more.
            Paw and Tail, the fatherless, raised their small voices. “Yiiyiiiooooo!” Again, and yet again. A thin strand of sound flying away in the wind. Who shall hear them? The keening?
            “Who will breathe for us?” called Lope, at last, in agony of heart. “Who shall walk among us and before us?” She called into the low clouds, to the sky, to Maker, to all who hear such things.
             One who hears and sees a lot, and to be honest, talks a lot, did hear their songs on the black wind. And though she would normally have flown on mighty wingbeats up to her high nest in the rocks at a time like this, she felt pity.
 
            As they stood around him, a great Raven, fighting against the storm, feathers ruffled, came to them. She saw that he lay motionless on the deep wet grass near the tree line. She saw Lope, the mother, standing bleakly with her children.
 
            “I see that your lord is no more, Mother. What is your name?” said Maeve. She spoke softly as a mother herself, who had lost someone also.
            “He called me Lope when we were joined in life. I called him Love, oh great dire bird,” whispered Lope. “Have you a name, Bird,” asked Lope.
            “I am Maeve. No bringer of evil. I am a sort of messenger,” said Maeve, as kindly as a creature with a croaky sort of voice could manage.
            “I will tell you about he whose messenger I am. Perhaps you have heard of him who rules here?” said Maeve.
            “I know that there is such a one, but we have stayed far from the towns and the people, away up north. No,” said Lope. “We don’t know him.”
            “I think the best thing for all concerned, is for me to bring you to him, and he will know what to do,” said Maeve.
            “Do we dare to come before him at a time like this and as weak as we are?” said Lope.
            “Yes, you do dare, for he is wise and good, Lope. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he already knew of your plight. He has ways of knowing,” said Maeve. “He listens to the wind you know?”
            “Very well, Maeve, we shall come before him, as you say,” said Lope.
            “I will lead the way, flying low. You must follow closely, all of you. His home is a little hard to find unless I bring you,” said Maeve.
            So follow her they did, wherever Maeve led. Through the wind, the rain, the darkness, they watched carefully and followed her until at last they came to the Home Clearing. The great Raven, with the four wolves following close behind.
            The fire had burned down to a bed of glowing coals but was still warm. Ramona and the children and the cats were tucked into bed in the cave behind that subtle green door.
            But Ralph himself sat near the fire, as if waiting. The wind didn’t blow so hard here, and the rain mostly stayed away. At last he saw Maeve and the family approaching.
            He saw her fly in low and slow followed by the mother with her children, a grown son, and two small ones. He remained sitting, so as to not loom over them in the night.
            “I’m sure glad I didn’t have to wake everybody to get to talk to you, Boss,” announced Maeve. “Look who I found standing at the tree line around their fallen lord!”
            Ralph did look.
            At last he said, “I heard something in the wind. It woke me and now I see the cause.
            “What is your name, lady, and the names of your children?”
            So, she gave him their names and since Ralph has this way of comforting creatures, they all sat close to the fire, near his feet, looking up to him.
            “I think I know what to do. If you agree, lady Lope,” he said. “Do you want to hear it?”
            “Maeve said when she first saw us that you would know what to do. So, yes, I want to hear it, sir. But, first, what is your name?” said Lope, for Maeve hadn’t said his name yet.
            “They call me Ralph. It’s a bit of a long story, for another time. The name my mother gave me is a little hard to remember and even harder to say,” said Ralph.
            “Very well, we shall call you Ralph,” said Lope, feeling better and better as the conversation went on. Gnaw and the cubs, Paw and Tail, gathered near, feeling better also.
            By now, Maeve was perched on his shoulder where she could hear the whole thing. She was very good at remembering his decrees and decisions for later reference.
            “This is what I think we should do, Lope. I think it would be right for you to make your home with us here. I always wanted a family of wolves here and I know my family and even the pumas will be happy too. It’ll be great! You’ll see! We’ll all have so much fun! I can’t wait! So, how about it?” Ralph said happily and then waited for her answer.
            Lope looked at each of her children. She saw only gladness there. So she turned to Ralph, and said, “yes, you’re right. That’s the very best thing we could do. We will stay here with you and your family. Yes. Our thanks, sir!”
            “This is great,” he said. “Can you sleep near the fire for the night? We’ll figure something better out tomorrow and you’ll meet Ramona and Twigg and Cherry, and the cats! I can’t wait to go tell Ramona!”
            Lope said "of course", that they had slept much rougher than by a nice fire before.
            Ralph put some more wood on the fire, and since it was too late for Maeve to fly to her nest in the dark and the wind, he took her into the cave with himself.
            When he climbed in under the big quilt, he woke Ramona enough to say, “boy have I got a surprise for you in the morning! Wolves! Four of 'em!”
            “OK, Baby,” said Ramona, drifting off to sleep again. “I’m sure it will be fine….”)

Happy Wednesday & Open Thread Day

 Goobywobber.

            A newly minted term for a species of small feline mammal. I believe it makes reference to their predilection for complaining, about starvation mostly. There is also some emphasis on getting inside a person’s personal space.

So? It was all a dream then?

 

           

            “Willie! Do you remember when I was talking to a new cat, the other day? She said her name was Sleeky Sue? And, and she and a wolfdog guy and a folk singer were running an ice cream shop in Missouri? Do you remember?” said Suzy.
            “I don’t remember you saying anything about any of that, Suzy!” Willie looked baffled.   
            “Well, I remember it all distinctly. I also remember telling you about it!” said she. “And, then when I told you the best thing about Sleeky Sue, that she was free, you told me all about how that’s why you want to bust out of here!”
            “I do want to bust out of here, Suzy. But the rest of it is nuts!!”
            “But, Willie! If you don’t remember... what does it mean?” said Suzy, with ears, whiskers and tail on full alert.
            “It means, most likely, that you were asleep, sister dear. As they say in all the books, to get themselves out of a tight situation, it was all a dream!” said Willie.’
            “Oh,” said Suzy, recalculating. “But, it was a really good story, wasn’t it?”
            “Almost believable,” said Willie. “But sure! It was a heck of a yarn. You should work up some more dreams!”
            “It seemed so real,” said Suzy. Then she gazed out of the glass door, deep in thought. She was thinking about Purring up Toots...

A King is the King of Everything

 

            Sometimes when visitors come to the great forest they hear a sound. It’s unfamiliar to them but pleasant. It’s deep, almost out of the range of human hearing. Sometimes they think it is the wind playing among the rocks and pinnacles of the mountains themselves. Some even think it might be a sort of ringing deep in the bones of the mountains. A natural process surely.
            “Mommy,” a small girl or boy will say, “what is that noise? It makes my ears buzz a little.”
            And then, perhaps, Mommy will say, “I think it might be the wind vibrating fir branches, Honey.”
            The wind, which is said to be prideful, is perfectly happy to be blamed for the intriguing deep sound.
            When the sound ends, and all the expected noises in a forest resume, most of them let the strange deep resonance sink deeply into their memories. The picnics commence. Photos are taken. There is so much to admire, so much to just absorb.
            Then, paradoxically, rested and tired, the happy visitors hop in their vehicles and leave the forest right before sunset. The peace of the forest will stay with them for days, maybe weeks.
           
            There was a day when Ralph was sitting with his children, telling them stories, no doubt. That was his way of getting them up to speed with who they are. On that day, Cherry, who was getting to be a rather big girl of maybe five years, spoke to her father.
            “Da’, a tree is dying.”
            “Oh? How do you know, Cherry?” asked Ralph. “That is a serious matter.”
            “I looked at the ends of the branches, Da’. There are no new buds, like all the other trees have. I went up there, and I looked,” Cherry said, earnestly. “Also, I couldn’t hear it.”
            As he looked at the little blond creature leaning on his knee, Ralph knew that she had been up in the branches of some fir tree. She hadn’t forgotten how to do that, but he and Ramona had asked Cherry to please stay on the ground most of the time, at least when she was alone at play.
            “You couldn’t hear the tree doing its song?” said Ralph.
            “It didn’t sound like anything!” said Cherry. “It’s dying!” She wept a few little tears gazing up into his face. Ralph realized that this was a serious matter that required his immediate attention.
            “Mona,” he said, “Cherry and I must go see about a tree. We will be back before night comes!” Ramona nodded as if to say, “of course.”
            “Take me to this tree, Cherry,” said Ralph, standing up, preparing for a walk.
            “Yes, Da’. It’s way past your big log!” answered his child.
            With that, they set off together. Ralph walking, and Cherry more or less floating by his right elbow. They walked and floated past his famous log/office, where a lot of serious king business was conducted, and then deeper into the forest.
            Great trunks gathered round. Dark, greenish, nearly black bark watched them as they went. You could say they sighed for the trees know their earthly king when he passes. Their arboreal souls were lifted up. It’s a mystery!
            At last they came to a place where the path became very indistinct. A deep grove of ancient Douglas Firs stood there as if in waiting.
            “This one, Da’,” Cherry said, drifting over to one particular trunk, old and massive.
            Now, it is true that each tree had a light whispery song, if a person had ears to hear it.
            Ralph came near this one and laid his head against the trunk, and reached his arms around it in a mighty embrace. He listened for a long few moments. He nodded to Cherry waiting beside himself.
            “This one is tired, Cherry. Just very tired,” said Ralph at last. “Not dying.”
            “Did she tell you why she is so tired?” said Cherry. She looked like a little blossom floating there in the dim light, waiting on his words.
            “A forest spirit wept here, Cherry,” said Ralph. “She laid her head here,” he said, indicating a spot low on the great dark trunk. “She came here deep in sorrow, and as she lay here she drew strength from the tree. She lay here until her heart was light again and went her way.”
            “Oh,” said Cherry.
            “Help me, Cherry. I will sing to her, and we shall see what we shall see! Come and put your two hands on her trunk, here and here.”
            So, Cherry put her two hands, here and here, and closed her eyes to listen.
            Ralph sang that deep song. The same song the forest visitors hear sometimes and don’t understand. He sang for a long time, until the day changed and began to darken a little. He sang until the tired tree heard his singing and was healed.
            “That’s enough, Cherry. We should go home now,” said Ralph. “Your dear mother will be looking for us.”
            “We will visit this tree again. You’ll see. She will be fine and making good little buds too,” said Ralph, as they walked, and floated, back down the way to the Home Clearing.
            Soon, they could see the fire glowing way down the path. Twigg and the puma brothers were there, and Ramona stood there watching Ralph and Cherry return. As they got closer they could see her smile.
            She had made potato and mushroom soup with a lot of Thaga’s onions and a lot of Thaga’s good butter also. No one knows where Thaga gets butter, but she does!

💛

After The Students Took Off

 

            Ralph felt like he had had enough excitement for one day, so he told Ooog, while Thaga was out arranging all those pink and red and white roses in her biggest jug, that he thought he would wander on home. He thought that it might just be getting close to dinner time at the fire circle.
            When Thaga came back, Ralph was gone. “Well! Gone so soon!” she observed.
            “He started thinking about dinner. You could see it on his face,” said Ooog.
            “Ralph loves his dinner almost as much as he loves his Firekeeper,” said Thaga.
 
            Maeve located Ralph on the path to the Home Clearing.
            “What’s going on, Boss,” said she.
            “I decided to visit Ooog and Thaga and I met some students from the big city. I might have clarified some points in their minds, Maevie,” said Ralph, strolling along.
            “Oh! They didn’t know, did they?” said Maeve.
            “Nope, and now they do!” said Ralph.
            “Are they alright?” she asked.
            “Yeah. We ended up buddies!” said Ralph. “It’s all great, Maeve. Every bit of it!”
            She just had to say it. “Evermore!” And she gronked a couple of times for good measure.
 
            When Ralph, with Maeve riding along on his shoulder arrived home, he smelled a rich and tantalizing scent. Roasting pheasants! With lots of garlic, another gift from the Neanderthal’s kitchen garden. Life without garlic just didn’t seem possible now that he thought about it.
            “Mona!” he called, as he approached. “Your pheasants called me home!”
            “Hi, Baby,” said Ramona. “I thought you would turn up pretty soon. So, what’s going on at Thaga’s place? Anything good?”
            Her attention returned to her grid and her pheasants, which just needed one more turn to be perfect.
            Maeve lifted off to go find Twigg and Cherry. She like to help keep an eye on them and nothing works like an eye in the sky for that task.
            “I wanted to see how Ooog was doing in the garden. I thought maybe I could help him or something. I wonder if we could make a little garden somewhere, Mona. I’m not sure where, but maybe along the river somewhere, you know, where there is sunlight. Not under the trees here,” said Ralph.
            She sat down on a log section, still holding her long fork. She looked a little shocked really.
            “I’m not sure that’s a good idea. We are Forest Keepers, Ralph. Not farmers. I think I heard a story a long time ago about human people having to leave a perfect garden and begin working hard to make their own gardens. It felt like a warning,” she said. “Maybe it would be best to live the life we have been given?
            “Even before Ooog and Thaga started sharing their nice things with us, we were living a good life here in the forest,” she said.
            “That’s true,” said Ralph. “We didn’t have garlic and salt and pans, but we did alright. I suppose there is a place to stop changing. It’s just a matter of finding where that place is!”
            “I think gardening might be a step too far,” said Ramona. “Learning to speak with humans was a huge step, but we seem to have weathered it alright!”
            “Yeah, I think it has been nothing but helpful, to be able to communicate with our human friends. Oh, of course you’re right, Mona.
            “It’s almost like that photo thing, gardening like mankind might affect our definition too much. I don’t want to be some kind of monster hybrid thing,” said Ralph. “I want to stay here forever with you.”
            “Me too, Ralph. That’s what I want,” said Ramona.
            “By the way, what did happen at Thaga’s place?” she added, remembering to ask, finally.
            “I met some students. Well, I surprised some students by opening the door and letting myself in. I didn’t know they had those two there. They had come to interview Ooog and Thaga about something to do with who they were and all that. So, anyhow I popped into the living room, the girl took one look at me and fainted. Then the boy started trying to get his camera to work!” giggled Ralph.
            “That never works!” said Ramona. “Was the girl okay?”
            “She woke up. It took her a minute or two. But, she discovered that I wasn’t the bogeyman after all, and we all parted friends!
            “So next week, same time, I’m to stay away so Harold’s cameras and stuff will work!”
            Ramona laughed. “Good idea!”
            Twigg and Cherry, running with Bob and Berry, arrived with Maeve flying circles over their heads just for fun. Then it was dinner time.
            Ramona laid the pheasants out on her little stump table and sliced them up into nice serving pieces. She served the children while Ralph watched affectionately. Then she served himself. Then she gave the cats two nice servings on ground level on some clean leaves. She put a nice piece in a bowl on one of the logs for Maeve.
Finally, she fixed a serving for herself, and sat down, well pleased with her work.
            The sun began to go down, and all creatures began to feel a bit sleepy.
            The morning, and the midday, and the evening had made a very fine day in the great forests of the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, and Ralph's kingdom.

That Day At Thaga And Ooog's House

 

            Spring was coming for sure. Ralph knew it. Everybody knew it.
            The days kept getting longer. The sunlight actually began to bestow some heat. Birds were courting. Buds were bursting. He could almost hear life. In fact, there was nothing intangible about that at all. Spring is noisy in the great forest.
            Even the river was making more noise than usual. All that snow melt was rushing down to Puget Sound as fast as it could go.
            Ralph felt like doing something. He was a little restless, in a nice comfortable way. He decided to trot over to see Thaga and Ooog, just to see how preparations for the garden were going. Maybe he could help out he thought. Thaga and Ooog were so generous with their garden produce and with so many other things also.
            He didn’t bother to send Maeve ahead. He knew a visit would be fine with them.
            Now, as it happened, Thaga and Ooog, being one of the last known Neanderthal couples, had caught the interest of a pair of anthropologists from the university down in Seattle. Word surely gets around in the academic community. Somebody told somebody else, and there you go. This required serious research.
            A letter was sent, an answer was sent back, and a date was settled on for a visit from the anthropologists. That day was this day. The very day that Ralph had decided to just show up.
            These kids from the university were Harold Forrest and Destiny Humboldt, graduate students on a mission of research. How many students get to meet Neanderthals these days. Not many! They were excited. They were ready.
            Thaga and Ooog’s place was not like the Home Clearing. It could be reached by normal methods. It had an address that was searchable, and they did receive mail sometimes. A person could drive quite near, park, and then walk in on a nice path along a smaller river. Altogether a pleasant arrival.
            Harold and Destiny loaded up with recording equipment and gifts. Before leaving Seattle, Harold drove by one of the local Sees stores so they could get a five pound box of dark chocolates with nuts and chews to bring along. Destiny wanted to stop to buy some flowers, so they did that too. She ran in and bought a couple dozen roses of various colors.
            Harold drove north into Snohomish County, then up into the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. It was just like a day off. They were having a great time being off campus and free. Maybe a little bit of love was in the air. They were young and it was spring. You know how it is.
            Harold drove his Civic, 2015, up the gravel road which he had located by means of internet and paper map and parked by the mailbox. The mailbox proclaimed Ooog and Thaga, 101 Forest Road. Destiny looked all around. “Wow, Harold. We are in the sticks for real!”
            “That we are,” said Harold and they got out. The recording equipment really only amounted to a new GoPro, and a notebook, the paper kind, He also brought his old laptop computer. All of that was in his pack. He also carried that huge box of chocolates.
            Destiny was in charge of the roses. She also brought her usual junk in a big leather purse. She carried a new iPhone, so she must have been thinking of taking photos too.
            It was a well worn path through the tree line which concealed the house.
            “It’s so quiet out here,” said Destiny. “Nothing but birds and a little wind in the trees.” Compared to their campus, it was quiet!
            They walked beside the small tributary down toward the house. It took maybe ten minutes. It was a charming walk, like a dream, it seemed to the kids. Soon they came out into a sunlit area, a meadow.
            The house presented itself. It looked like something from Mother Goose maybe. It was low, fitting into the landscape cozily. The lower part was made of large river pebbles and the upper part of smallish logs. The roof was made of local slate, and the few windows were comprised of many small panes. There was a large garden patch which was in the process of being prepared for planting. A great big tabby cat lay on the porch sunning himself. It looked too good to be true to Harold and Destiny.
            The tomcat removed himself as they approached. Harold knocked on the door.
            The door, which looked for all the world as if made by Hobbits, was opened by a cheerful looking short lady in a long floral print dress of black and pink, with a blue and white striped apron over it. She also wore a handknit grey sweater, and her graying hair was up in a fluffy knot on her head.
            “Come on in,” said Thaga. “We are dying to meet you! Oh! Roses!”
            So, Harold and Destiny, smiling a little shyly, went on into Thaga’s kitchen. They presented their gifts. The chocolates created quite an impression. But Thaga loved the roses.
            “Ooog, come and meet these anthropologists, and look what they brought!” she called out to the other room.
            Ooog appeared. His long white hair was newly braided and hung below his belt. His beard was also braided into two plaits. He had his leather pants on, his homemade shoes, a little elfin looking, and a blue cotton shirt under a gray woolen pullover sweater.
            His eyes were brilliantly light blue and had smile crinkles all around. Ooog also had a rather large nose. The whole effect was gnomish in the extreme.
            Destiny drew her breath in sharply. These people were all you could ever hope for in a pair of latter day Neanderthals. It was almost too good to be true, truly! And they spoke English!
            “Hello, I am Ooog,” said Ooog, laughing a little. He admired the gifts and invited Harold and Destiny into the living room to sit so they could talk comfortably.
            It was just then that Ralph arrived.
            He knocked on the door, and as had been the habit between them, he opened the door and walked in. Finding no one in the big kitchen, he went looking for his friends in the living room.
            “Oh dear,” said Thaga to herself. But there he was. Ralph. Bigger than life. In her house with these poor students all of a sudden.
            Destiny took one look and fainted, falling limply back against her chair.
            Harold leapt to his feet. He started fumbling with the GoPro…
            “Oh, hi, everybody,” said Ralph. “Did I bust into a party?” He smiled, checking out the newcomers.
            “No, Ralph,” said Thaga. “They are Harold, with the camera there, and Destiny, who has fainted. I guess you scared her. They came to interview and photograph us for their papers.”
            “Is she alright,” Ralph asked, looking concerned.
            “I believe she will be,” said Thaga. “She looks to be waking up right now.”
            “Have a seat, Ralph,” said Ooog. “We’ll make introductions and see if we can all sort ourselves out here.”
            So, Ralph settled down into a special very large wooden chair that Ooog had made just for his visits. He tried to look as agreeable as possible, but goodness he was very large and very hairy.
            “Harold you may as well forget the camera,” said Thaga. “It never works around my friend Ralph here. I’m not sure why. Some goofy thing his wavelength does to electronic stuff.”
            “Well, shoot,” said Harold. But he believed her, because the thing was not working in fact.
            Destiny woke up. She was nodding her head and saying a few things to herself, but she held steady. For a real anthropologist, this was a dream come true, something she had never expected to happen in this world. Oh, she knew a bit about Forest Keepers, and she had discussed the possibility with Harold several times.
            When it came down to it, they all had a lovely visit. Ralph was his most charming, and eventually Destiny just loved him. Harold thought he was great. He made some written notes, but didn’t get any photos.
            “Why don’t you come back next week at this same time,” said Ooog. “If Ralph will stay home, you can get photos and record us talking and all of that.”
            Harold said, “you bet. We’ll do that!”
            They all sampled the chocolates and drank some coffee.
            It started to get dark, so Harold and Destiny said they should take off and that they would see Thaga and Ooog next week.
            “Goodbye Ralph. It was wonderful to meet you,” said Destiny. Harold nodded.
            “Goodbye,” said Ralph. “This was a great surprise. Maybe someday we will meet again. You never know!”
            Harold and Destiny left with their heads in the clouds thinking of wonderful papers that could be written. They held hands on the way back up the path to Harold’s old Civic waiting for them up by the mailbox.
            When they got as far as Milltown, they stopped in a Chinese restaurant on Broadway because they were getting hungry. They had a lot to talk about, and then, love was in the air after all.

💚

            

A Bight No-bight Situation

 An Observational Open Thread

bight(n.)

Old English byht "bend, angle, corner," from Proto-Germanic *buhtiz (source also of Middle Low German bucht, German Bucht, Dutch bocht, Danish bught "bight, bay"), from PIE root *bheug- "to bend," with derivatives referring to bent, pliable, or curved objects. The sense of "long, narrow indentation on a coastline" is from late 15c. In Middle English it also was used in reference to the body, of the fork of the legs or the hollow of an armpit.

 

                Not a bite, or a byte, but a bight.

                The subject came up because we were winding a ball of yarn off of the skein. It took a while, so I was thinking about the nature of things, and stuff. I recognized that what we were dealing with was a whole lot of bights.

                Being around boat guys and ropes for many years, I knew the word to mean “not the end of the rope”, but the middle. Not the business end, ahem. But I didn’t know how it was spelled.

                Upon being informed, I looked it up. Ah. Suddenly it occurred to me that my favorite sedative, knitting, is just a tremendous number of bights. It’s all loops within loops, with various contortions.

                So much of human culture depends on what is done with a line, a string, a yarn, a rope. It’s quite basic. I like to imagine what came first, and what it was for.

                A bight is not the beginning, nor the ending, it’s the middle, the very very long middle. A good picture of “now.”  Now is when everything happens or is done.

                Enough of that! As it happens, as I learned up there in the quote, it can refer to a crenellated coastline. In that regard, I offer this poem, which is quite nice. 

 

The Bight

By Elizabeth Bishop, 1949

 

At low tide like this how sheer the water is.

White, crumbling ribs of marl protrude and glare

and the boats are dry, the pilings dry as matches.

Absorbing, rather than being absorbed,

the water in the bight doesn't wet anything,

the color of the gas flame turned as low as possible.

One can smell it turning to gas; if one were Baudelaire

one could probably hear it turning to marimba music.

The little ocher dredge at work off the end of the dock

already plays the dry perfectly off-beat claves.

The birds are outsize. Pelicans crash

into this peculiar gas unnecessarily hard,

it seems to me, like pickaxes,

rarely coming up with anything to show for it,

and going off with humorous elbowings.

Black-and-white man-of-war birds soar

on impalpable drafts

and open their tails like scissors on the curves

or tense them like wishbones, till they tremble.

The frowsy sponge boats keep coming in

with the obliging air of retrievers,

bristling with jackstraw gaffs and hooks

and decorated with bobbles of sponges.

There is a fence of chicken wire along the dock

where, glinting like little plowshares,

the blue-gray shark tails are hung up to dry

for the Chinese-restaurant trade.

Some of the little white boats are still piled up

against each other, or lie on their sides, stove in,

and not yet salvaged, if they ever will be, from the last bad storm,

like torn-open, unanswered letters.

The bight is littered with old correspondences.

Click. Click. Goes the dredge,

and brings up a dripping jawful of marl.

All the untidy activity continues,

awful but cheerful.

🤍

    The title up there refers to an old joke about sharks and biting. With sharks, it's one way or the other. Spelled differently though.

I Am Julia Nez

 

 The Badlands outside of Joseph City, Arizona.

            Remember me? That girl with the Golden Frog?
            I should probably explain a little. But where to start?
My beginning? Alright. But to back up a little, my mother and father are Beth and Jesse Nez. That’s right. Dad is a Navajo, a member of the Dine’. My mother is a white lady of mixed ancestry, including some “war whoop” from way back.
            They tell me that I was born during a terrific rain storm. There was so much rain that the road flooded and the doctor couldn’t get out to the house to assist. Therefore, my great aunt Julia Chee did the honors, with my dad standing by and helping. I am an only child. In fact, they were totally surprised when I came along.
            My Aunt Julia and I were very close, while she was alive. Now, that’s another interesting point. Julia Chee had a way of disappearing and reappearing. The last time, no body was ever found. It remains a mystery where she is. I have theories. Things have a way of being dreamlike here, the only place I have ever lived.
            I have the earrings her John gave her, and her name. They used to call me Emmy, so we didn’t get mixed up in conversation. My middle name is Marie.
            I am a Namer, and a Caller. These touch the root of reality. It is a gift.
            I named the Golden Frog, and a largish gold nugget became my confidant. I am too young to remember the time when he was found, but they tell me he came from my great uncle John’s little mine up the hill here. You probably know the story better than I do, how the Long Horn bull, thrashing his horns about, dislodged the nugget from the wall.
            Dad and mom didn’t sell it in town. Dad gave it to me to play with.
            Golden Frog has never lied. He is a straight as daylight and just as revealing. I talk to him, to figure things out, and he always helps me do that.
            Then there was the night I met the great cat who was my aunt’s friend. I named her too and she was pleased. Dina. If you could imagine the sky purring, that’s how enfolding her contentment was.
            I left the local public school at 15. Homeschool is legal in Arizona. I am 16 now and still reading and writing and I can do math. I sure don’t miss the bother and business of school. Freedom is a wonderful thing.
            I often wondered as I was growing up why we lived out here on the Reservation. The story came out gradually. It was hard to believe. Why would some dark power be threatened by my mom? She didn’t seem like the type. Maybe that was her super power, looking harmless.
            We have always lived out here more or less off the grid. Oh, some of the people in Joseph City knew mom and dad were here, but Indians don’t generally spill the beans. We are chary of too much talk. And here I am talking, but you guys already know the score. So, it’s OK.
            I feel like we are friends.
            I am not as tall as my mother. Mom is a biggish girl. I am darker than she is, like dad. I have curly black hair and brown eyes. I stand about 5’6” tall, and I am skinny like my dad is. My parents say I am pretty, but parents always say that.

THE MIDDLE

 ________________________

            “The Seer is young. She sees herself as a Namer. That’s fair,” said Dina, benevolently.
            “It comes from lack of experience,” said the other.
            “Caller, Namer, Seer, are all of a piece,” said Dina. “I like the child very well.”
            “That much is obvious,” said her friend. “You have a new Julia.”
            “We shall see,” said Dina, the Great Cat herself, “how well she lives in two worlds!”

___________________________ 

 

 I thought everybody was like this!

 
            They are not! When I was little it felt like they were kidding me. Like they heard part of what was said or saw part of what they were looking at. It confused me.
            At school I imagined that the other kids and the teachers wore hoods or blinders.
            I knew the secret intentions of hearts. That is why I was so happy staying home with my parents and my beloved auntie. Golden Frog could see all of that too, so we had a lot to talk about if we met a new person.
            One day, when my parents had gone to Joseph City for shopping, there was a knock on the door. I put my book down, taking note of the page number, and I thought about whether I should answer the knock.
            I was not afraid.
            “What do you think?” I asked Golden Frog.

💚🐸💚

The Latest Word From KittyComm™

 

 
            “I met a new cat today!” Suzy was bursting with the news. She had gone to find Willie to tell him all about it. She found him lounging, (sleeping) on the gas heater, the coziest spot of all.
            “Oh, a new one? Not Toots or Sammie, or Buddy, or Charley, or Mr. Baby? Who is this one?” said Willie, stirring himself enough to open his eyes.
            “If I tell you  her name, you will laugh at her, Willie,” said Suzy.
            “Come on. How bad can it be,” said he.
            “It’s not bad. But you’ll laugh at her. And she is a very smart cat!” insisted Suzy.
            This was beginning to sound a little interesting, so he woke all the way up.
            “Tell me. I promise to be nice. Trust me!” grinned Willie.
            “I trust you to laugh, that’s all! Her name is Sleeky Sue  There!” said Suzy.
            “OK. Sometimes we get a weird name and there is nothing we can do about it. People lay some mighty strange names on us! I heard of a cat called Diagonal. Then there was Botulism. Why? I don’t know.
            “What’s her claim to fame, Suzy. There must be a reason you’re so excited,” said Willie.
            Suzy hopped up on the heater also. Best place to be, really. That pilot light provides just the right amount of heat for a cat’s belly. But I do digress…
            “Number one, she is free. She has made her own way in the world! Her adventures are almost beyond belief, but I do believe her! I can tell when a cat is lying,” said Suzy, with a meaningful little nod to her brother.
            “See. That’s why I aim to bust out of here! What can I do stuck in here all the time?” groused Willie, who actually has it pretty good considering all the mathematical possibilities.
            “Even if you did bust out of here, you wouldn’t do what Sleeky Sue has done!” said Suzy.
            “Sue is the brains of a three person business. An ice cream shop in Missouri! They call it frozen custard there. Weird?” said Suzy.
            “She was really excited to find out about KittyComm™, and she promised to talk more when we can all get together. She will tell us about Maurice and Folkie Joe. She promised!”
            “Are those two cats also?” said Willie.
            “I don’t think so. They are in the ice cream business with her,” said Suzy.
            “Let’s call it a night then, Suzo. Maybe we’ll hear more later,” said Willie, already nearly asleep.
            “It’s just another open thread anyhow,” said Willie. “You know how that goes.”
            “Yeah,” said Suzy. “Sometimes storylines get all mixed up. But we  have fun anyhow!”
            “That’s the main thing,” said Willie.
            Suzy laughed a little to herself and then dropped off to sleep also.

🌸🤍🌸

One Midsummer's Day Among Friends

 

 

            “Maurice! Hey, buddy, good to see you! It’s been a long time since you got on that train up in Skykomish! Look at you, you look great!” said Ralph. “Have a seat! Have a seat! Everybody!”
            Watching, I felt like it had all been a worthwhile endeavor after all. Maurice was bristling with happiness and excitement. I had never seen him look so frisky, so in his element, the out of doors.
            The deep voice continued, “Who did you bring with you, Maurice?”
            “We started that ice cream shop together,” answered Maurice, while Joe and I found places on one of the logs. Joe set his guitar case on the ground beside himself and shrugged out of his pack. Maurice was still wearing his and that silly pet carrier, so he looked a sight.
            “I ran into Joe, he goes by Folkie Joe on stage, when I was hiding in the woods, and he was a totally broke street musician. Ah, Ralph! You’re still here!” said Maurice. “We had Dinty Moore stew together in the basement of an old beat up empty house! Remember that, Joe?”
            “Oh yeah, how could I ever forget that? I thought I was a dead man when you showed up!” said Joe, speaking for the first time. “Ralph, sir, I am honored to meet you! Maurice told us a lot about you, and your family and your pumas, and your home. Being here is fantastic!”
            “Was it all good, Joe?” laughed Ralph.
            “Yup! All good!” said Joe, nodding and grinning.
            “So, Ralph,” said Maurice, waving a wild hand at me, “this lady cat is Sleeky Sue. I call her Sneaky! She was in that rail car I snuck into. She saw that I was injured from breaking a fang out when I slipped. She helped me, and I helped her open a carton of cookies that was in there, and we got along just fine. She’s really smart, Ralph! The ice cream shop was her idea. She has a lot of ideas!” He kept waving his arms around.
            “Sleeky Sue!” said Ralph. I sat up straight, and tried to look smart, because Maurice said I was.
            “I can tell that you have been a great friend to my friend Maurice, here,” said Ralph. “Thank you!”’
            “King Ralph, for it’s easy to see that you are king here, I must say that both Maurice and Joe have made my present life possible. I owe them, sir. I am at a total loss to imagine where I would be without them! Ideas are all very good, but they are empty without the means to carry them out,” I said.
            “Joe made the songs that made the money, he’s quite famous now! Maurice has been my friend and helper all along,” I added.
            “I see that you are a truth-teller, Sleeky Sue. You and Joe are very welcome here. I thank you for coming. You have to meet Ramona. She’s around here somewhere…”
            I turned my head, and there she was! She stood behind me without having made a sound. Ralph’s glance had shown me where to look. The overall impression she gave was sweetness. As light and graceful as any deer she stepped near to the fire.
            “I am Firekeeper here. Welcome to my fire! Thank you for the long work of getting here!” she said. She was maybe seven feet tall and much more slender than Ralph. She was lighter in color too, and maybe softer looking. Her serenity was easily seen in her expression.
            “This is Twigg, our son,” she said, and suddenly he was there beside his mother. I guessed that he might be about ten years of age, and he was a fine looking boy, exuding energy and curiosity.
            “And here is Cherry,” said Ramona. A little blond girl peeked out from behind her mother’s legs. “Cat!” she said.
            “Hello, Cherry,” I said. She vanished like a puff of smoke.
            I introduced myself and Joe to Ramona, who was taking a seat beside Ralph.
            Twigg spoke up then, “These are my cats! One is Bob, one is Berry!”
            I noticed then that either Bob or Berry was crouched down by Joe’s guitar case, and that either Berry or Bob stood beside Twigg. I think I know when a cat is smiling. These cats were smiling.
            Ralph wanted to know about our trip. Joe told him all about the train ride across the country and a lot about what we had seen on the way.
            Maurice jumped in and described the finding of Allegory, now his red book. He showed Ralph that he had learned to write, revealing the pages that he had written on.
            “You amaze me, Maurice!” said Ralph. He did look amazed. I deduced that Ralph did not write, though his spoken English was excellent.
            “Sue taught me, it’s hard for her to write with her little kitty paws, but she sure knows how, she also taught me to read, Ralph!”
            “Well, you sure have surprised me! All three of you! Music and ice cream. A wonderful combination,” said Ralph. Maeve still sat on his shoulder, just listening to the talk.
            “Do you all like trout? I was about to pan fry a whole bunch of them! Ralph has figured out a way to talk them into coming to him! Silly fishes!” said Ramona, with a slightly carnivorous giggle.
            We all said that sounded great, so she went to work right before our eyes. She cleaned many fish and laid them out on a big square flat pan on a grid over her fire, which had died down to nice coals. It doesn’t take long to cook fish the size of trout, so soon we had a fish dinner. There were shallow wooden bowls to eat from that appeared to have been made by hand of course.
            As if to answer my thoughts, Ramona said, “Our friend Ooog made them!”
            Just as I was admiring them, there was some noise from up toward the other end of the clearing. Ralph and Ramona grinned at each other as another Forest Man appeared. But what a different sort he was. He was pouchy and saggy looking, with a sleepy looking face and rather dusty looking hair.
            “Here is Uncle Bob,” said Ralph. “He likes to have dinner with us sometimes!”
            When he got close, he seemed to see the extras around the fire clearly for the first time. He goggled at us for a minute and said, “Wow, Ralphie! Are you guys having a party?”
            “Kind of, Bob. It’s kind of a party,” said Ralph, explaining who we all were. “Come on in Bob, have some fish! We have lots!”
            “Cool,” said Bob. “Hi, you guys. Hey, you brought a guitar, man! Can you play it?”
            “A little bit,” said Joe.
            “It’s been a long time since I heard a guitar,” said Uncle Bob. “I really like the Dead, man!”        
            “So do I!” said Maurice. “Show him what you can do, Joe!”
            “Alright, man,” said Joe agreeably.
            He played, and sang, Mountains of The Moon, Saint Stephen, Golden Road to Endless Devotion, and Alligator, to my absolute amazement. Joe always said he wasn’t a fan.
            Uncle Bob wept tears of joy on his bowl of fish. Maurice sat rapt, listening.
            “Thank you, man,” Uncle Bob sniffed happily. “I better go back to the Stump. Thanks for the fish, Ramona. It was a party, Ralph! Good night, everybody!” And he sort of woofled off the direction he had come from. Presumably that was the direction to get to his Stump house.
            The sun went down. The fire glowed. Ramona tidied up the after dinner things.
            “I think I’ll go home too,” said Maeve. “I’m getting sleepy.”
            The stars came out overhead. The smoke of the fire smelled sweet and dreamy. I heard an owl. A little bit of wind drifted through the trees.
            Ramona sent Twigg, Cherry, Bob, and Berry, into the cave to go to bed.
            “I think this is the happiest I have ever been,” said Maurice. By the light of the remaining fire, he wrote a few notes in Allegory. Without his fangs he wasn’t very scary looking. I was very fond of the guy. He was alright for a reformed Ozark Howler.
            Ralph yawned a little, and said, “So, Maurice, what do you think? Where should you be? You could just stay here on the west side of everything. Or you could go back to Missouri to help Folkie Joe here and Sleeky Sue. Either way could work out fine. Which sounds best?”
            Maurice cocked his head, looking at his old friend just across the fire circle. “I love you Ralph. You are more to me than a brother. I love Ramona and your kids. But I think I am changed. I can’t live the forest life now. Maybe I am getting a little old too, you know? I might even be a little lazy. I think I will go back with Joe and Sue.”
            “That sounds right,” said Ralph. Ramona smiled at the old Howler, who grinned sheepishly back at her with the firelight shining in his eyes.
            “So,” said Ralph. “Would you guys like to go home the easy way, or the hard way, the way you got here?”
            “Sir,” I piped up, “If there is an easy way, let it be as you say!”
            “Is that OK, Joe? Maurice?” I asked.
            Both nodded, as they had so many times before when I made a decision.
            “You can come back when you want to, of course,” said Ramona, “we will always be here.”
            “Gather up your packs, the guitar, and the cat thing, and hold hands,” instructed Ralph. Well, I could see that being in the carrier might be best after all, so I got into it. Maurice put it on over his shaggy chest. Then he and Joe both donned their packs. Joe clamped the guitar case between his knees, to keep a good grip on it. Then, with me between them they held hands and waited.
            “Close your eyes and picture where you are going,” said Ralph. We thought of the apartment in Branson and Ralph began to sing. It sounded like nothing I had ever heard before. It almost sounded like the wind, but deeper, and there were words, murmured in an unknown language. He sang and sang.
            We opened our eyes standing together in the living room of Joe’s fancy apartment in Branson, Missouri. The place smelled a little stale like a home does when no one has been home for a while.
            It was like we had never been gone, but Maurice still had Allegory in his jacket pocket. Proof enough for me! He had notes too.