Then, On The Other Hand

Does there exist a social phenomenon
exemplified by adolescent angst
more fraught with adult irritation?
Children's propensity to view their
inner landscape as needful beyond
the grasp of parents' realization
exhibit a profound sense of self-
entitlement guaranteed to be met
with perplexed bedevilment.

Surely this emotional affliction
besets only offspring of socially
emancipated, economically-advanced
countries whose children have never
experienced deprivation and the
compelling drive toward advantage
leading inevitably to survival...?

Children who cannot conceive
of the desperation of endemic, deadly
disease, malnutrition, a stifling
of the yet-hopeful human spirit.
Little wonder exasperated parents
would admonish and remind their own
of starving children abroad. Witless
young remain fixated on their boredom,
not the distant reality of a workhouse.

Perhaps, on reflection, this malaise
is in truth a gift of nature's design.
Cleverly imposed and engaged to release
from the frustration of stasis, the
creative genius of a Socrates, a Galileo,
a da Vinci, an Einstein. Towering figures
of human intelligence and unsurpassed
achievement through creative drive.

Humankind designed in nature's image.

It's Not Your Fault

"Don't cry Enid", he said anxiously. Awkwardly attempting to wipe away her tears.

"That wasn't fun! You said I'd like it. Well, I didn't!" she whimpered, pushing him away, tears fully released, washing down her pale face. "You said you love me! You hurt me!"

"I'll never do that again to you, I promise", he said, meaning every spoken word, struggling with himself for composure; needing he knew, to reassure her. To re-establish trust.

There was a strained silence, broken by her hiccoughing attempts to gulp back her sobs.

Then normal life resumed. Their respective school buses taking him off to his second year of high school. Hers to another small town located near the family farm, to her mid-elementary-school years.

Their mother was pleased with his recently-renewed willingness to attend Sunday sermons. Didn't know what had gotten into him to begin with, to stubbornly resist the family's weekly faith outings. Resented that her husband sided with the boy. When what he needed was a good smack across the face from time to time.

Sitting in the pews alongside the other pious-orderly parishioners, he was able, surreptitiously to hold his sister's hand and she did not, this time, rebuff him.

"Why're you hurting yourself like that?" her best friend gasped, recoiling in fear and disgust when Enid shared her new secret, shoving her sweater-sleeve up to reveal an angry, still-seeping slice on her upper arm.

"I'm not!" she denied. "I don't want to hurt myself. It feels good, that's all. It makes me feel good!"

"You're punishing yourself" her friend accused angrily. "You feel guilty. It's not your fault!"

Enid lifted her delicate blond head to appraise her friend. She shrugged, grimaced, fought back an odd smile. Looking straight at the other girl, she mimicked her concern, repeated mincingly: "It's not your fault", and then barked a sharp, bitter laugh. "What do you know, anyway? Think you're so smart? Got an answer to cure everything, haven't you?" And she walked away, leaving her friend incredulous, gasping for air.

"But I want to help you!" her friend shouted after her receding back.
Didn't ask you to, dummy. Don't want your bloody concerned help.

They'd known one another since they were eight, friends from elementary school. Spent their spare time together. No. That was true once, a few years ago. Not so much, more latterly. Erin had become detached, moody, uninvolved.

Her best friend was, in fact, her only friend. She was aiming for none.

Dr. Pearson keeps telling her she should talk, talk, talk. Talk about anything that enters her mind. Talk about her relationship with kids at school, with her teacher. Give him her impressions of their characters, what she liked about them, what she didn't. Did she even like her teacher? Doubt it. Casually, he said: talk about your family, your mother, father. How about your brother? Your other brother, the one your family took in? Him too. He wouldn't interrupt, wouldn't ask any questions. He'd just listen. Make no comment. Just there for her to kind of relax about things, get things off her mind. It would help, he told her. Help her to feel better ... about everything.

She had cousins, two girl cousins. Not cousins exactly, but close. Extended family. Her own age one, the other younger. Their father was her father's nephew. They didn't get along, never did. They thought they were superior to her because their father had inherited the better farm.

Her father had inherited their hardscrabble farm. The family, all of them, had lived in that rural neighbourhood so long the road was named after them. There were other family members on other farms, none as successful as the one owned and operated by her cousins' father, though.

But they did operate as genuine farms. Erin's father kept a few highland cattle, a goat, some laying hens, a donkey and an old swayback horse. He didn't do any farming, though. Erin's brother, now he was older, helped her father's nephew at his farm. It was located just up the road. Erin's brother's ATV was handy for getting around. He sometimes let her ride on it with him. But he preferred to be with his friends, racing around, rather than let her hang around.

That was outside. Inside their house, that was different, then he was approachable, amenable to her presence, teaching her things she might never have imagined left to her own devices.

Erin had developed a habit of telling people matter-of-factly, as though she thought they might be interested, that she hated her father. People rarely asked her why, just brushing it aside as a curious way for a young girl to speak of her father. A good man, well liked in the area. He worked at a factory to support his family. His farm was a farm in name only, not actually worked. But if anyone did pursue the statement by questioning her, Erin would reply "because he's mean to my mother".

Odd that, in most peoples' minds. Those who had some knowledge of the family. Erin's mother happened, as they knew from first-hand observation and rural gossip, a sharp, unforgiving whip of a tongue and she lashed her husband at every opportunity. He responded by shouldering it all. His shoulders, over time, became narrower and narrower, hunched, as though he could somehow protect his tender chest with its wildly beating heart from the onslaught that diminished his self-regard so irremediably.

Her friend, her best friend who lived a mere few miles' distant that sometimes slept over at Erin's house. As Erin had at hers, for they had been best friends, hadn't they? Her friend remarked to her own mother who questioned her that she had never noted anything out of the ordinary, he'd always been kind, and nice to her. She did mention Erin's mother's belittling tirades directed toward her husband. Thought little of it.

Her friend's mother thought how odd it was that the child who in her younger years would embrace her at every opportunity when she played with her own little girl, had become reserved, standoffish in the last several. Although, she noted also, she readily lost herself in the childish joy of being with a friend, doing things that friends, young girls, do together.

Dr. Pearson said softly, Erin, do you feel badly about what happened to you? Do you blame yourself? Don't, Erin, you're not responsible. You were a little girl when it started. Hardly knowing what was happening. Someone you trusted and felt comfortable with kind of disappointed you, didn't he? All right, you don't have to respond to that.

Probing, he's always probing. Sometimes she feels better, most often not. But everyone says it's therapy, it'll help her, she's got to continue going to see him. He's a nice man. She doesn't mind him. But really, what's the point? There's just no point to all of it.

On her 12th birthday her brother took her into town, in their father's pick-up. He wanted, he said, to do something special for her. He knew how much she wanted pierced ears; he'd cleared it with their mother. Excitement! You bet, she really, really wanted pierced ears, so she could wear gold hoops. She wanted neat, symmetrical gold hoops. And that's just what he got for her. She hugged him, her face radiant. And his face, looking fondly down at her, happy for her.

As far as their mother was concerned, it was a display of worldly vanity; the limit, as it happened, to which she would agree. She would allow Enid to wear short-sleeved tee-shirts, but only so long as she wore long-sleeved hoodies over top. Her mother needn't be informed that, at school, the hoodies came off in the classroom, even through the winter months.

She had nothing to hide, anyway, unlike most of the other girls. She remembered a birthday party at her best friend's house a few years back, when she and the other invited girls had gone for a dip in the pond out back behind the house. When Mrs. Haig came out with a camera to take some shots, she had impulsively pulled down the top of her bathing suit, and posed in an exaggerated position, much to Mrs. Haig's consternation. The other girls were giggling, hiding their faces behind their hands. Now if they'd done that ... she was the only flat-chested girl there. So, big deal.

By then someone else had joined their household, a young man whose parents had disowned him when he hit rock bottom, addicted to drugs and alcohol and living on the street. From whence her mother's church had salvaged him, given him temporary shelter, encouraged him to take advantage of addiction counselling, and then proudly produced him at a gathering of the faithful as yet another symbol of Christ's merciful redemption of feeble humanity. Her mother had sat straight up to attention, her eyes riveted on the bashful young man. Inspired, her mother had offered the youth, through their pastor, a permanent home with them. Erin's father was appalled, fearful, his faith not as deeply entrenched in the restorative capacity of agape.

"We've got a developing girl at home!" he protested.

"What!" his wife shot back. Questioning the judgement of her Christianity. "He's redeemed himself", she barked. "More than I can say for you ... think I don't know about those bar stops?" She needled him about his "bad habits", his "sinful ways", his lack of contrition when she found him out.

"He'll need to be shielded from your influence", she huffed. "But as good Christians this is our duty. I've pledged to take him in, can't retract, what would everyone think? How would that make us look?"

In the end, the argument was hers to triumph, always was, and he mutely acceded. In the end, the young man, several years older than their natural son, proved his gratefulness, mollifying Enid's father's unchristian doubts. While earning him additional contempt. Was that remotely possible? Why yes, it was.

Enid's mother's generously capacious mental storage where she meticulously filed all of her husband's failures, incapacities, incoherent responses justifying his existence and her misery, proved more than equal to the task.

Enid, suspicious of her new 'brother' (she was severely schooled to regard him as an older sibling) soon relaxed in his presence. He was an introvert, unlike her 'real' brother, but quietly courteous, helpful to a fault. He even went out of his way to sit with her after dinner and help her with her math and science and geography homework. She was grateful. He had a neat sense of humour, leaning heavily on dryly casting aspersions on himself. She became very fond of him.

And so did the entire family, finally. Although Enid's father would wince every time his wife reminded him bitingly that the job the young man eventually found paid more in salary than his own hourly-waged one, helping her to begin decorating and furnishing the old house rather more graciously than they had long been resigned to.

A year and a half later, the grateful young man left, to strike out on his own, to reap opportunities awaiting him in Toronto, as a budding, ideas-rich entrepreneur. Six months later, Enid, accompanying her mother by train, visited their lost sheep in prison where he had been remanded awaiting trial for dealing drugs.

It was on their way back home again that Enid casually mentioned to her mother that she knew all about sex. It was no mystery to her. Her mother turned in her seat, regarded her daughter with an air of disbelief, lifted her hand and slapped her face.

"It's true, Mother", Enid said. And guess who? My brother. Not once, not twice, but over and over and over again. She watched her mother's face blanch. "Steve....?" her mother burbled. Enid laughed. She twisted her fingers. Wondered why she was doing this. What was wrong with her? "No, not Steve, Mom. It's Kevin."

Her mother turned away from her, stared out the window at the moving landscape. A heavy silence moved between them and Enid felt she could feel her mother's ... furious anger toward her. She would blame her. She knew she would.

"Don't tell your father", her mother finally said, turning back to Enid, pleating her own fingers in her skirt. "I'll look after everything", she said. "Are you all right? Poor kid, all this time..."

"It's all right, Mom. It's all right" she said softly back to her mother. And then she began to worry. "What'll happen now?"

"I've got to think", her mother said. "We'll work this through, somehow. Did you ... did you ... provoke him, your brother? Did you do something to ... make him do this?"

"I don't know. I love him. He loves me, he said he loves me."

"He's your brother!" The agony in her mother's voice startled her.

"What's going to happen to him, Mom? Can we kind of forget what I said? Maybe I'm not serious. Maybe I'm making all this up. Mom?"

"No", her mother said, heavily. "We can't forget it. Have you had your period?"

Later, at home, when her mother was busy in the kitchen. That's when she informed her father. She still doesn't know why.

Enid hates this about herself.

Landscape

The landscape-sodden lenses
of our eyes freeze that surprising
frame. Frozen with surprise at
nature's impetuous mischievous
spontaneity. One moment an
sensuously benign arras, the next
a thumping wind ravaging the tops
of winter-bare trees, sending them

into precarious companionship
knocking steeples, showering
the ground below with an offering
of shattered green-needled limbs.
Episodic ruptures of the peace
observed on a mild winter's day
succumbing to another weather
system moving through with

sudden squalls, snow so thickly
reeling into the landscape, shoved
this way and that by the
commanding winds, everything
becomes invisible; a moving,
flecked sheet of icy crystals
transforming everything into a
blaze of white conformity.

The ferocity of the wind soon
has us snow-plastered, moving
like silent alien creatures -
through a landscape of primal
atmospheric conditions -
intent on securing survival.

Last Night, This Morning

Last night the huge velvety vault
of the sky was aglow as rarely seen.
Dimpled with hugely-gathered
snow crystals becoming bright
sparks of crystalline, light-refractive
distractions billowing languidly.

Softly evanescent clumps of snow
crystals languorously drifted
through the earthly atmosphere
luminously illuminated by ambient
sky-diffused light from the
vastness of the city-scape below.

In bright, soft shadings of melon,
mauves and pinks, shedding their
own borrowed brilliance, the
binary snow-gatherings made their
journey, finally assembling into a
vast, all-encompassing comforter
contouring the landscape.

As dawn sent its dim waking light
over the horizon and into the
soft new arras, birds stirred,
lifting heads from under recumbent
wing-havens to view their
brilliantly altered landscape.

The Ancient Tapestry of Light

Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. ⁴ And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. ⁵ God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night.

He sat on the yellow soil comprised of sand and clay, legs folded under his torso, hands held in an imploring gesture before the deliberately heedless throng. His white dishdashah was no more stained than that of most, and his keffiye neatly arranged on his head; his grey beard as indicative of age, as their own grizzled faces. His eyes, they were different. They were not, in fact quite there. They were rheumy, running hollows, to which bottle flies were attracted, distracting him from attracting the attention of those who might give alms.

They turned away from him, despite the Q'uranic injunction to charity, for his appearance was repulsive and it shamed them also, that there were amongst them some whose need was clearly greater than theirs. And theirs was great enough.

He, caring little for their disgust, entreated them to pity and to do the will of Allah in recognizing his need. He shifted his position on the ground, vainly attempting to find comfort, and his visage took on the savage look of misery incarnate, his shapeless lips no longer forming the grimace he thought represented a smile.

Carrion-seeking birds, vultures with their red-ringed heads and long wrinkled necks thrust forward, crested the sizzling sky. Dust was everywhere, circulating in the lower atmosphere, clogging peoples' throats and nostrils, and those of their livestock. It settled, mud-yellow, on everything; the lintels of their homes, roofs, worn carpeting placed over olive, oil and water jugs. Building interiors were neatly inlaid with dust, particles of the cosmos, infinitesimally minute atoms representing everything and nothing.

Dust stifled the air of the marketplace, the plaintive voices of the women, heads carefully covered in deference to the Q'uran's injunction to female modesty, complaining about the steadily rising prices of mutton, fowl, dates, figs and grain. Risen too steeply for their liking, for their ability to pay. Mothers reached down to slap small hands that crept to the top of stalls hoping to snatch a nutmeat. Infants slung across their mothers' chests, held by stout linens, bawled in a disorder of animal and human sounds.

A hawk streaked the sky over a copse of date palms, shrilling. Wispy grey clouds, barely seen against the particulate matter crowding the canopy of the sky reflected the tattered grey of once-white garments. Glancing toward the west, squinting eyes could make out a sun-dog, portending some atmospheric change, perhaps another khamsin, perhaps a clearing of the sky to something resembling blue, inviting the overhead sun to bake the ground and burn bare feet.

In the near distance rose a curvaceously slender minaret, needling God's overheated sky. Cicadas buzzed the atmosphere. The sound of the muezzin calling the faithful to prayer rang out and resounded in the still, torrid atmosphere. The hum of the crowd became muted, faded, as all turned; the women removing themselves from male proximity, to prostrate themselves facing Mecca.

The lyrical melody of a prayer as familiar as one's beloved's face piously rose to the heavens, toward Allah's patiently demanding hearing and benign approval, as his people surrendered for the third time that day to daily prayers.

In the courtyard of the Khedive's palace, roses, peonies, lilies, Persian cornflowers, delphiniums, safflower and red poppies thrived in vivid array and brilliant colour, sending their fragrance throughout the generously measured space. Where also grew olive trees, willows, pomegranate and bitterweed. Also acacia, wild celery, dill, henna and mint.

The cooling, tinkling sound of a water fountain fetched the senses to swooning, as the water fell gracefully back into the shaped pond wherein swam golden- and silver-hued fish among the blue water lilies and papyrus plants. A small, wrinkled man busied himself snipping spent flowers, stopping now and again to inhale, when a broad smile would overtake his toothless mouth.

Not a hint of cooling breeze to be felt anywhere. Not in the souk, nor along the dusty alleys, or in the palace courtyard. Within the seraglio, sensuous, full-bodied women with kohl-described, smouldering eyes spread their languid limbs on colourful divans. Within this area could be heard the melodic whispering of the fountain as it circulated in the dry air.

A grossly overweight Eunuch, his taut skin glistening with sweat, fanned himself desultorily, in a vain effort to find relief from the sweltering, gasping heat. He sat in the doorway, eyes vacant, dreaming of another place, where his ancestors had dwelt and of which he had heard whispered longings from his parents before he had been whisked mysteriously away in the night as a child, to this place.

The white, diaphanous fabric of the women's garments served to accentuate their voluptuous flesh, lovingly scented with aloe. Their pale skins glistened too, in those places which remained uncovered, but they were not dreadfully overheated, for large feathered fans moved the air about them, handled with ease by cherubic-looking little black boys, unclad but for a loincloth.

The women's soft voices resounded in gentle probing questions; one of the other, in solicitous regard, humming through the sumptuously appointed chamber within which they spent their days. One inhaled a water pipe. Another plucked the strings of an oud, a second held a tambourine.

The wing holding their many children was not far away and they might visit at will, but their duties lay here, looking beautiful, rested, inviting. Entertaining themselves. Engaging in the kind of gossip women thrive upon; their own inimitable, useful and socially binding transference of news. Besides which, they were all to one another, sisters, mothers, companions in bondage.

Their latest intrigue was the introduction of another, younger woman. A girl, really, but more than adequately nubile. Her introduction awaited verification of her intact hymen. They knew little of her, but that she came from afar, and was not of their tribes , nor a familiar of the clans. She would need to be comforted, they knew. Abbad Pasha did not tolerate discord in his harem.

A slave, young and graceful, carried a tray of refreshments. Dates, and grapes, and watered wine and pomegranate juice. Nectarines, kumquats, nuts and sesame paste. The fruit was welcome, and the young man was as well, for young as he yet was, he was beautiful, too. The women rose to surround him and tease him, and he blushed as their hands ran softly over his arms and his legs.

At the souk, a camel herder cursed as his lead camel ventured too close to the food-bearing stalls, and hit the beast repeatedly on its back, its snout, kicked it viciously to encourage it to back away and begin anew. Its outraged groans elicited no sympathy. Stalls laden with nuts, grains, dried fish and olives stood out in the main traffic area where most people shopped. Linens and rancid hides were to be had there.

Closer to the protective walls of the palace stood small semi-enclosed shops with copper objects, silver jewellery, linen garments and woven rugs. Slippers, leatherwork redolent of curing camel urine, along with tablahs, and dumbeks, and mizmars could be had there, as well. Not for most, but there for those whose wherewithal was equal to the prices of these esteemed objects. The occasional palanquin moved through the crowd in the torpid heat.

The beggar half-heartedly swatted the flies that plagued his existence, before finally realizing dusk was falling and he had no further hope of charity this accursed day. He awaited the appearance of his eldest son, upon whom he would lean as they hobboled back to their hovel.
He steeled himself to accept the burden of bringing nothing of value back with him.

He longed, in his fevered mind, for the impossible; a return to the time when his wife's adolescent face beamed whenever she saw his approach, her esteemed uncle. His eyes had been capable of feasting hungrily on her youth, grace and beauty. Now what greeted him was her silent reproach, and the plaintive mewling of their malnourished children.

His tormented spirit shrieked in haunted agony that would give him no peace. First, light left his eyes, leaving him in a dark universe of bitter disaffection and abandonment. Then, the light of belief had abandoned him. He had submerged himself in the poison of despondency, apostasy, denied the comfort of eternal Paradise.

Woe betide him.

God is the Light of the heavens and the earth;
the likeness of His light is as a niche
wherein is a lamp
(the lamp is a glass,
the glass as it were a glittering star)
kindled from a Blessed Tree,
an olive that is neither of the East nor of the West
whose oil wellnigh would shine, even if no fire touched it:
Light upon Light
(God guides to His light whom He will)

Winter Fog

Clouds of water vapour hang
like shimmering grey fabric
over the masts of the forest.
Late-January rain, above-freezing
temperatures have swelled the
atmosphere with fog, melting
the landscape's hills of snow.

Trees stand slickly black, but
for the newly-gashed snags.
Water droplets hang like a
multitude of festive glass ornaments
from the sharp needles of Hawthorns
and knobby twigs of wild apple trees.

The ravine's creek runs wide and
wild, particulate-laden and mud-brown
musically rippling over detritus dams
and under bridge trestles. The sharp,
dank odour of swamp gas rises into the
atmosphere driven by the roiling,
rampant release of snow-melt.

Mist rises from the ground like
ghostly reminders of forests past.
A great barred owl hunkers solemnly
on a limb halfway up a towering
poplar, shakes its sodden feathers
then settles again into his fierce,
hunter's gaze. Voles, mice and

chipmunks, be aware ... be fearful
and live to celebrate another season.
Still, a bold nuthatch presumes to announce
its chirpy presence, brightly nattering
timidity not its style, even in the
near proximity of a dreaded raptor.

On the far western horizon
a break in the solid metallic sky,
as the setting sun casts its swift
departure sending radiance to
blaze the sodden world below.

Grandma ... The Wolf!

Grandma, what an enterprising nose
you have been endowed with, sniffling
and snuffling around everyone else's
business as though it were your own;
poking relentlessly into the cloistered
privacy of others' intimacies and
hitherto unsuspected failures.

Grandma, what an amazing mouth
you have, so extraordinarily involved
in spouting opinion, analysis and
synthesizing conclusions, inexorably
leading to the restoration of global
sanity, yet there are so frustratingly
few interested listeners ....?

Cannot you be more judicious in
your interventions, in an effort to
appear more lucid, informed and practical?
Much depends, Grandma, on your
persuasive voice, for that rabid wolf
is breaking down defences
even as you desperately rail...

Grandma,what perplexingly
large eyes you have, envisioning
slights that do not exist, identifying
unintended lapses, the personal tragedy
of overlooked courtesies. Grandma,
condemn them all, for the wolf
of incivility is at the door!

This Glass House

Trees thrive in robust denial
of the season here. It is the
dead of winter in this nation's
capital city. The coldest, snowiest
such city on this planet.

Yet birds in blazing colour
and exotic shape flaunt
themselves, immune to the
crippling cold. Vines entangle
their landscape, in luxuriant
abandon of weather inclemency.

Leafage of immense bright green
emblazon themselves in brazen
display. Narrow-spined grasses
loft themselves into prominence.
Floral buds in every conceivable
shape and size seize the arras.

Blooms of flowers familiar and
treasured raise their radiant heads
in proud presence. Blue lakes glisten
and glow, refracting the
ambient, life-giving light.

A forest of trees thrives in colours
of pine, beech, spruce and birch.
Distant hills march into the background
humped and evanescent with
another season's colouration.

The watery deep too is here,
its dazzling conceit of shells and
aquatic plants and schools of
biddable translucent fishlife
languidly swimming through
their refulgent oceanic atmosphere.

We are surrounded by Nature's
kaleidoscopic presence, overwhelmed
by her gracious gifts within the
interior of our glass-stained home.

Winter Forest Ambiance

The woods are still, the atmosphere
chill, a wind disturbing the pale,
paper-thin leaves clinging to
immature beach trees, rattling them
like nervous spinsters hoping
their time finally, has arrived....

A white icy haze hangs over the
creek, halfway to shedding the ice
holding it in winter hibernation. A
tiny nuthatch breaks the silence
flitting through a copse of fir and
spruce, companion to a flight of

chickadees.

New-fallen snow in soft, flaky
clumps has patterned the debris-
laden snow, packing the winter
wood with its fresh loftiness,
mounding old tree stumps,
like mischievous ghosts.

Soon, fresh forest drama unfolds
on this winter stage, as a clan
of well-met black-winged messengers
arrive, circle endlessly under the
cloud-riven sky, and caw their
propitious assemblage.

A lone squirrel objects, chattering
scolding endlessly.

That Creative Spark

When I think of her - though I don’t, too often - what comes to mind is one of those archaic fertility figures created in pre-history, long before written language to convey the idea of primal female fecundity. What it must have seemed like, thousands of years ago, to try to fathom the idea of the creation of human life that women were capable of, and the dominant creatures, men, were not.

In her own way, she was the personification of Gaea, the ancient Earth goddess, who brought life to all natural things, organisms infinitesimally small, and gigantic creatures of land and sea who once reigned supreme before homo sapiens appeared.

Gaea must have been an amorphous figure of spiritual need, to believe in some supernatural element that was responsible for the world that mystified and surrounded, and succored and plagued early human creatures.

She too was very elemental in one significant sense, for she wished nothing more for herself, of her life, than to bear children. She experienced this overwhelming need not as an adult or even as an emerging adult, but as a child, and expressed it to anyone who would listen. It was thought to be an amusing aberration in an otherwise-normal childhood.

As she grew older she learned to muffle that voice inside her, to give it honour, but no longer to express its message vocally, because it made her the object of derision. As she matured into young womanhood, she did so at an extraordinarily early age. It was as though her child-bearing psychosis had prevailed upon her hormones to rush things along. At twelve years of age she already had assumed an hourglass figure, to her parents’ great consternation.

At fourteen, entering high school, she resembled a tiny, perfect Venus. Her face was no more than pretty, but framed by a loose, curly mane of chestnut hair, a perpetual and genuine smile, combined with that curvaceous body, she presented a formidable sight. One the boys at the school honoured by lusting after in their disturbed night-time hours, and which the girls at the school snipped and sniped at cattily, while in the process spreading rumours of her easy accessibility.

She was innocent of all the commotion she left in her wake because she had no guile. Her outward physical presence may have been expressed by an defined aura of sexuality she herself was unaware of, but her mind was a fairly simple one, although not without intelligence. She performed well enough at school, but she would be no academic prize-winner and her parents anticipated little other of her.

She had a younger brother with whom she was quite close, no more academically-gifted than his sister, but a robust, happy-go-lucky boy interested in all manner of sports. They lived, at that time, close to High Park in Toronto, where the parents, both hard workers, had managed to buy a three-story house sitting high on a hill.

Since the parents both worked, the brother and sister were left to their own devices most of the time, once school was out. A large attraction for both was Sunnyside pool, and they spent long summer days there, during summer vacation. That was their vacation, in fact. The brother had a large circle of friends, and his sister a circle of familiars, and they both enjoyed life. Their parents were comfortable with their children’s social progress.

They were, however, puzzled more than a little by their daughter’s dreaminess, her apparent disinterest in being part of a clique of girls who might spend time together. Her clear absorption in maternal things, how her attention was riveted when she saw a mother and child took them aback. But they approved as their daughter offered baby-sitting services to the young families living on their street, and glowed at the praise that came back from those whom she sat for, filling their proud, parental ears.

Their daughter was clearly no scholar, but she was healthy and a beauty. She had a quiet and gentle personality, and an easy laugh, a healthy sense of self. What more could any parent ask for?

It was annoying to put up with a steady stream of bashful young boys hanging around their house, hoping for a glimpse of their daughter, waiting for a brief, casual acknowledgement as though they had just happened to be passing by, and ran into her by chance. Their daughter never seemed to notice these serendipitous meetings of chance, but they did.

It wasn’t too long, though, before their daughter appeared to have made a huge impression on a young boy whose parents were well known to be among the privileged and the wealthy, and that gave them great satisfaction. They encouraged her interest in the boy, and went out of their way to make him feel comfortable when he dropped by.

Their daughter was still in her first year of high school; the boy one grade higher. And they became extremely companionable. Their companionship resulted in the first pregnancy. Nothing could be said to persuade the girl that she could end the pregnancy. After all, she would not yet be quite 15 when the pregnancy came to term. There was no thought of forcing the girl to respect her parents’ alarm, to acknowledge their sense of shame. Her intention was to have this baby. She focused on the child that would finally be her own.

Marriage appeared to be out of the question. Although these were the days before women’s liberation, and it was more common for two scenarios to eventuate; a) the societal-convention-offending girl would be left on her own, disowned by her outraged parents, or b) the two young people would be joined in a ‘shotgun’ marriage. His parents, aloof and disinterested, instructed him to absent himself. And he did this, although his attraction for the girl and hers for him constituted a powerful magnet and he struggled with their edict, before accepting that demand.

No one attempted to keep the pregnancy a secret. She left school, which she considered no great loss. And she immersed herself in the care of her baby. Before too long they met secretly, furtively, in area parks, she wheeling the baby in a carriage, and he riding his bicycle, to fortuitously meet up with her.

They were re-united, and nothing would cast them asunder, the girl’s boyfriend told her, and she was grateful. Her parents accepted him once again, as their daughter’s - what, boyfriend, lover, husband-to-be? None of that, they just sighed and thought that what would be would be.

The parents were away from their house far more often than they were resident in it, working long hours. The father worked as a tailor at the Tip Top Tailors factory in downtown Toronto and the mother worked there too, as a seamstress. They had laboured there for many years, ever since they had immigrated to the country and they were both held in high esteem as skilled, reliable workers.

Their children’s futures were important to them. They were not disciplinarians, they never went further than gentle remonstrations with their children. This was a different world, a different culture and society, and they hardly knew where they fit into it, even yet. But this country did allow them to be gainfully employed, and protected as citizens, and to prosper.

Their daughter’s boyfriend, in defying his parents’ command to no longer see their daughter, was disowned by his parents. What else could they do? They took him in. There was no awkwardness, they simply, casually, accepted his presence. None were disposed to press for marriage; not the parents, nor the young people. They all just lived amicably together, the young couple given the largest of the bedrooms on the second floor of the house. Rooms on the third floor were rented out, to other people.

Unsurprisingly, while their daughter stayed at home looking after their first grandchild, the child’s father kept attending school. Unquestioningly, the parents supported their daughter, her child, her boyfriend. Since their daughter remained dedicated to having children, and appeared to be content with the way her life had unfolded, there was another child, a girl. Over the course of the years that it took for him to complete high school, two additional babies struggled their way out of their daughter’s womb. And when their daughter’s boyfriend began university, nothing much changed. In total seven children were born to their fecund daughter; all but the first, girls.

After their daughter’s boyfriend obtained his undergraduate degree, his father contacted him, and informed his son that if he agreed to continue university and to obtain a law degree, he was prepared to take him into the very lucrative family firm. With the proviso that he leave his present living accommodations. And begin another life entirely.

They were prepared, he intimated, to do their part to give financial assistance to the raising of the seven children he had sired, as long as he agreed to never again enter the house where the mother of his children lived, along with those children.

To the girl’s huge consternation, her lover approached her one day with the great news. She sunk into a great funk of incomprehensible misery, and remained there for an entire week, when she bestirred herself to the reality of her position and the need of her brood.

She would never again place her trust in a man. She no longer needed a man, in any event. She had her precious children, her beloved infants who needed the alert and loving presence of their mother. She pulled herself together and resumed her life as it had been, serenely, albeit absent her lover.

The children grew and they thrived. When they were all in the primary school system, their mother sought paid employment. She was hired by a department store, in their women’s apparel section. She was still a lovely looking woman, and she had that knack of dressing herself modestly but elegantly, without having paid much for her clothing. Some people are capable of looking outstandingly well dressed, no matter where their garments come from.

Before long she was promoted to manager, and also became the women’s apparel buyer. She enjoyed her job tremendously. And was so very proud of her children, growing out of their early childhood.

And then she met someone who reminded her of her lover. This was a young blonde, very tall man of Dutch extraction who worked for the Pilkington Glass Works. Their mutual interest soon matured into steady companionship. Which itself soon was promoted up the ladder to his moving in to live with her at her parents’ capacious Indian Road house.

Wonder of wonders, an eighth child was born, and its mother was back once again, housebound, and happy. Her new lover somehow injured his back while at work, and applied for Workmen’s Compensation. So he too began to spend all his time in the large old family house. The entire family living together in the communion of acceptance. Her brother had long since graduated high school and had bought a taxi license.

She became a grandmother while still very young when her second-born child herself bore a child. The oldest, the only boy of the eight children, would remain a confirmed bachelor all his life, and would also become an locally-acclaimed chef. The other children began scattering around the world, some to live in the United States, others elsewhere in Canada, and one to Australia.

But once a year, in the summer, they would somehow manage to come together, hauling their own children along with them, to the large cottage the grandparents had bought well before they expired, in the Muskoka region. Which the no-longer young couple eventually inherited. And then sold, choosing to buy a condominium in Florida where they spent the long winter months.

And they bought a year-round house for themselves not far from Algonquin Park, in the Haliburton Highlands. Where they both tended a lovely garden, and where she discovered she had a talent for watercolour painting. She created much-admired, delicate compositions; still-lifes, bucolic landscapes, water-wheels, ivy-overgrown cottages, robust young children at play. Make that cherubic toddlers whose portrayal would break the hardest heart. People admired and enjoyed her painting, and she acquired a reputation as an local artist. Many of her delightful compositions were printed as greeting cards.

She was grieved when her partner of so many long and companionable years contracted a miserable cancer that eventually took his life. She flew out to Australia to spend a few months with her daughter. Planned to sell their rural property, and buy a new condominium being built in Orillia, Ontario. Somehow, things dragged on, and she waited almost three years before the condominium was ready for her to move in. By then she was in her mid-70s, and felt that life had been good to her. Hadn’t it been?

She not only had borne eight children, but had no fewer than 28 grandchildren, and a dozen great-grandchildren. More, many more on the way. This woman turned out to have founded a dynasty. This was her life's destiny. And she fulfilled it. She sat in her new condominium building with its large windows looking out onto a woodland, and mused, turning the pages of one of her many family albums.

Winter-Silent Woods

Yesterday's snow has covered the
ice on the frozen creek. Tiny animal
prints in to-and-fro patterns
mark the fresh, smooth blanket.
Conifers are once again brightly
limned with glaring white, clinging
to branches and needles sheltering
chickadees and companion nuthatches.

The broad silver-grey bowl of the sky
looks down on a transformed landscape
yet promising additional surprises.
Ice fog envelopes the forest, arrived
on secret, solemn, slippered feet padding
through the atmosphere, soft white
aspect ephemeral; veiled loveliness.

In the rough grey crotch of a fine old
ironwood overlaid with crusted ice and
fresh snow, leavings of a pine-cone
meal informs of spare feeding and
winter scarcity for the small animals
waiting out thin diet's dearth.

The woods are still, and tranquility
reigns, yet intercepted by the brief
overflight of a whistling, searching hawk.

Wearable Art, Disposable Dreams

The dresses - actually they were full-length gowns - took up an awful lot of cupboard space. On the other hand, their new house had plenty of storage space. And there was just two of them, so what need did they have to conserve space? If they were the conserving type they wouldn’t have sold their four-bedroom two-story only to exchange it for an even larger house, albeit with three bedrooms.

The larger house, with its spacious walls, some two-stories in height, better suited him. Fact was, over the years he had assembled quite an art collection. And he wanted to be able to hang everything, see it all. And that’s just what he did. But he was so busy continually that he rarely took the time to stand back, look at his precious paintings. Which didn’t stop him from always being on the look-out to expand his collection.

As for her, those ball gowns - for that’s what they really were - nagged at her. There was a time, once, when she wore them, when they attended formal events. That time was past. She couldn’t bear, she thought, to dispose of them. Besides which, even if she’d wanted to, she knew he would object. They were beautiful, and he loved beautiful things. Objects that were well-designed, well crafted, made of exceptional materials, expressing creativity and aesthetic perfection. He had a keen eye for these things, they delighted him.

So there they hung, sumptuous garments wonderfully well made, recalling a much earlier ante-bellum era, never to return to the world of fashion. Crepe de chine, gossamer net, silks, satins, bows, furbelows, flounces, ribbons, sequins, beading. In ivory, scarlet, the palest of melon colours, these were fabulously lovely gowns. When they’d bought them, in a mad spree of acquisition, he’d had her model them when they’d arrived home with their treasures, and he took photographs of her wearing them all. With their great layered, flounced skirts and close-fitting bodices.

She was a dainty woman. Even at thirty-five, which was her age when they’d bought those dresses in Tokyo. Of all places to purchase formal wear. But these were - or had been - formal rental garments, just like the coloured silk, massively embroidered marriage kimono that he also lusted after, as wonderful works of wearable art. The Japanese were extremely fastidious about everything; the food they ate, and the clothing they wore, particularly those worn on formal occasions. [ And what could be more formal than a wedding?] Where a social convention had arisen that part of the marriage ceremony saw the bride wearing a marriage kimono, so heavy the silk and embroidered lavishness of the garment that an attendant was required to ensure the bride was able to negotiate her way around without tripping over the kimono - far longer than her height. The bride’s face mirroring tradition, with its heavily white-powdered mask, the white extending over her neck, including the nape, where the collar of the kimono would be pulled slightly back. Beguilingly erotic, it was thought to be.

After the ceremony, though, during the formal dinner, there would appear stage central the modern Japanese bride, wearing a Western-style wedding gown, her face transformed with Western-style make-up; the stiffness of her Japanese white-face having slipped into the red-lipped, albeit shyly smiling new wife to whom toasts were being elocuted along with those for her new husband.

It was those kimono, those gowns, not all of them representing bridal wear, that were later sold at a fraction of even rental cost in the boutique sections of Tokyo department stores. When she had herself worn those gowns later - the Western-style gowns; the amazingly-embroidered kimono were meant to be hung on their walls, not worn - they caused a sensation. For one thing, her weight and shape hadn’t changed since she was in her 20s, and she looked far younger than her years, and the dresses, with her dark, curly hair, showed her off to as much advantage as she advantaged the garments.

They’d come across the gowns hanging in great spacious racks in a special area of the Mitsukoshi department store. Amazed at the presence of these sumptuous, luxurious, hand-sewn and -embroidered gowns made of the finest fabrics with immense care to detail. She had fingered them longingly. He had urged her to try one on. There was a series of very small change rooms set up for just that purpose. Go ahead, he’d said, give it a try; what can you lose? So, against her better judgement she selected a gown, took it along to the absurdly small change room and tried it on. He knocked at the door, said he wanted her to exit, wearing it so he could examine her radiant appearance in the gown. She did, he enthused about trying others on as well. She demurred, mentioned the money involved, and he laughed, then thrust another gown at her to try on.

The Japanese tend to be extremely curious about what foreigners get themselves up to. There hadn’t been anyone other than themselves looking through that rack of gowns. Suddenly, other shoppers took notice and began showing an interest. An interest that extended to a small bank of onlookers ranging themselves casually outside the change room. She was startled, wearing the second gown for exhibit, to see that she had become a focus of interest, and at her re-appearance onlookers clapped. She blushed, turned directly back into the change room to shed the gown and pull on her own clothing. But there was her husband again, with another gown, and the watching crowd erupted yet again in approving claps.

In their later postings abroad, those gowns were well utilized when the occasion demanded. There were six of them, and they more than paid for themselves from one posting to another, allowing her to dress the part of a diplomat’s wife. In one of their postings, where formal wear had been relegated to the back burner of society’s expectations, she had flaunted the informal eschewing of long dress, and worn the peach-coloured gown with its tiny seed pearls and self-cape, to great acclaim. She was photographed and appeared in the following week’s society columns, after which time formal wear was resuscitated; she had set a trend. (Which she hadn’t suspected, since, the following year, she chose to wear a slinky black silk calf-length cocktail dress with the long rope of black pearls she had acquired while still in Japan; and this time she was the odd-woman-out; everyone else emulating her costume of the year before.) Just shortly before they left on another posting.

But there they were, those dresses, taking up an entire closet that covered one whole wall of one of their spare bedrooms, and there they hung, for the next twenty years. Their presence alarmed her, haunted her, taunted her, reminding her of the time that had lapsed. She was now in her 70s. Even her granddaughter, who when much younger had so delighted in looking at those gowns, now thought them passe, uninteresting. Why had she ever imagined her daughter or one of her granddaughters might be interested in them? Clearly, they weren’t. This was an entirely different world they inhabited. All of them, actually.

Since they no longer attended diplomatic affairs, and hadn’t for over a decade. And even before her husband had retired such events were no longer the formal ones they had once been. She knew that specialty vintage shops might be interested in such garments. Among the cognoscenti, those with a large appreciation for the lushness of eternal fabrics, of classic design and sterling workmanship, these garments would have great appeal. And then again, perhaps not. Since there were no designer labels sewn carefully into them. They represented an earlier era, but were produced in the far East, where quality of workmanship was unparalleled but lacking the cachet of a Great House designer label.

So, surreptitiously, one at a time, she carefully folded the gowns, and took them over to her local Salvation Army thrift shop. Her husband would never notice. He hardly thought about them, so much time had gone by. And she had a yearning to see herself freed of their presence. She wanted to be able to open that clothes cupboard, and see a great yawning gap where the gowns hung. After all, wasn’t that the new trend? To rid oneself of all clutter. How did that mantra go? If you haven’t worn it in a year, discard it. Did that, she sometimes mused, extend to relationships?

Well, she hadn’t worn any of these exquisite garments in over two decades. She was now 70. Still the same shape, same weight, but her once-dark hair was decidedly silver, and her face, once smooth-complexioned was now weighted with wrinkles. Her eyes no longer bright, her carefully articulated eyebrows thickened, yet now barely visible. She was a ghost of what she once was. A faded, wrinkled elderly companion to her now-elderly husband.

Now this was something she rebelled against. She didn’t feel elderly. And there were times when she could look in a mirror and feel good about herself. Which she knew was entirely attributable to the fact that her faculties too were fading; her eyesight nowhere near as acute as once it had been. From a distance, viewing herself in a mirror, she could hardly make out the wrinkles, though the absence of her dark hair was remarkable enough. Her breasts did not sag, but her conformation had altered with the onset of menopause; her waist had managed, somehow, to thicken and her stomach to broaden. But not her derriere, and her legs looked as immaculately smooth and shapely as they always had.

But even if she had an occasion that demanded formal wear to attend, would she wear one of those dresses? Hardly; they would be a mockery; she, elderly and wan-looking in those scrumptious gowns crying out for a slender-waisted, sprightly young woman to adorn. (Even if her waist was still sufficiently slender to enable those long zippers to close.)

She felt guilty, nervous, carefully folding and packing the first of the gowns into a bag, and taking it along to the Salvation Army store. Leaving it there. As though she were abandoning something that had once meant something dear to her. As though she was leaving behind a bit of herself, her history. Preposterous to be sure, but she did find it difficult to part with them, even while she ardently wanted nothing else but to heave them out of her life, her cupboard, her home.

Five of those ball gowns were disposed of. She had no idea what had become of them. Who might have been attracted to them, who might have taken advantage of owning so elaborate a garment. Or what price might have been put on them. Not much, of that she felt abundantly certain, given the clientele of the place. But who knew? It had recently become attractive to many middle- and upper-middle-class people to recycle, to shop at such places.

One dress only remained. The bright red silk gown with the clusters of seed pearls sewn thickly over the bodice, with its hooped skirt that had a mind of its own when it was worn. Its puffed sleeves, and cinched waist under a shaped bodice made quite the fashion statement when it was worn. The skirt had swooshed about her as they had danced, away back then. It would also be the most difficult to part with. She had no idea, really why she felt so conflicted about their disposal, dispersal.

They represented a time long past, a tradition of excess that was no longer recognized in a society given over now to relaxed attitudes and lapsed social mores. They might be useful to someone as a costume representing a throw-back to another social era; to be worn to a masquerade party, or for Hallowe’en, for all she knew.

But she did know that difficult as it had been to shed herself of their ownership, she felt relieved finally to be rid of them. She slid back the door of the clothes cupboard, and carefully lifted the heavy, brocaded and beaded garment that shone with a life of its own as the bright satin caught the light from the overhead chandelier, and gently placed it on the bed. Then began folding it onto itself. No easy task; the overlapping skirts refusing to lay in place, the stiffened underskirts unfolding themselves as though resisting the intent to remove the garment from its long resting place.

It had to go. That long-ago time was just that, long ago. The gowns had little meaning for her now, though they were regarded by her husband as works of apparel-art, appealing to his aesthetic appreciation of creative objects spanning all categories of art production. He hadn’t noticed the absence of the other gowns which she had surreptitiously removed and taken away to the thrift shop. Nor would he notice the absence of this last one, until a complete inventory of their belongings was undertaken. And it would be.

Their collective property was to be categorised and inventoried and evaluated. Many objects of value would be retained, but many more were to be de-acquisitioned, sold to the highest bidder. In a general dissolution of joint ownership. Needful, since they were dissolving their intimate relationship. She would become an elderly, single woman, a divorcee. He was destined for another marriage, and she was bloody well damned if the much-younger woman whose welfare he had focused on as his future second wife would inherit anything that she had once worn.

Utterly illogical, she knew. But she also knew she was distraught, devastated, intellectually disabled, and there was logic to that.

Gloom Dog Days

One, then another, and another
with brief intervals between
the sharply painful losses,
they succumb to the illnesses
and frailties of old age,
leaving behind memories
and the loss of companionship.

Over several decades of
hailing one another, watching
them become playful together
their human companions
became familiar with each
personality and solemn or
bumptious, gleeful or restrained

canine character, calling their
names as casually as their
accompanying human companions.
The bond of familiarity and
that of camaraderie held fast.

Then, doleful news was posted
of the first to leave this casual clan
of comfort, the first ominous
signal of the brief and tenuous
nature of dogs among humans,
filling a special niche, then
departing, all too soon.

Over the years the losses
accelerated, each leaving behind
its aura of profound longing and a
resoundingly quiet and empty space.
No alternates or replacements
mended the gaps as the spaces grew
wider and more profoundly
infused with gloomy foreboding.

Ours now, the last two of so many
that once rampaged with the unaffected
joy of life. Gone, all others, their
clever and confident ease with their
environment absent from the woods
and ravines that once rang with the
decibels of their excited greetings.

Child of Bleak Misery

Astutely manipulative, capable of clever
sociological terminology explaining much
and little; never have we experienced
joy from you. Pleasure yes, when an infant
in those too-brief respites when you
were of a moment tranquil or blissfully
asleep. Since those distant times the
storms of your temperament have been
the distemper of our times made
troublesome and grey with your constant
and fervent dissatisfactions.

Never satisfied with anything, your
irredeemably sour view of life and failed
intimate relationships forever surprise,
alarm and sadden us. Your intransigent
complaints of the world's assaults upon you,
fortune's neglect of your needs, leave us
gasping with disbelief and denial. For
fortune gifted you royally, with good health,
intelligence, beauty and talent, all soured
by incessant dark moods, accusing
and assailing others' sensibilities with
rancorous demands to your dominant will.

How, we wonder, could such a warped view
of life have resulted from a loving and
supportive family; the ultimate communion
of love between parents, their concomitant
dedication to their children's well-being,
opportunities and experiences? Brief encounters
with you leave us emotionally drained, life-
force and spirit sucked dry. Your looming,
intimidating presence upon all who circle
your orbit leaves them gasping for release from
the malign tension of your dark and controlling
need to dominate. In the final analysis,

we feel trapped, manipulated, unblessed by
your dourly miserable plaints. Though we yet
love and struggle with compassion for your self-pitying
sense of life-betrayal, our need to rescue ourselves
dictates a distance you have yourself planned
and accommodatingly engineered.

Badger and belittle, excoriate and condemn,
stand in ruthless judgement, find wanting all others.
Yourself acclaim for reasonable understanding
of the dim failures of those you reject. Brook no
opposition or pleas for empathy. Reduce
another's resolve to shattered confidence. Prey,
endlessly. Wreak havoc with others'

sentimental attachment to rational communication.
Probe their weaknesses with the fine needle
of your unforgiving righteousness. Leave them
aghast at their helplessness in self-defence;
cringing before your white-hot anger, utterly
shattered. In the silence, reflect. Soon saving
introspection elicits "I'm sorry" and suddenly
we are loved, you are loved and all is forgiven.

Winter On The Ottawa River

Ice huts sit placidly prepared
for fishing over the ice-and-snow
blanketed Ottawa River benignly
bordering the capital city of Canada.
This is an immense waterway,
one of the watery giants of this
natural-resource-blessed country.

Where once sturdy voyageurs
determinedly began the history we
now barely recall, labouring mightily
to transport furs and virgin-cut
forests along its tumultuous length.

Where now towns and cities
flourish across provinces of
the founding nations. Ever at odds
over language and culture and
rare entitlements, whereas the river
knows its useful place in the
traditions of the country.

The mighty Chaudiere Rapids
harnessed for electrical energy
roil still though their vast power
has been constrained, stilled in
the interests of civilization's needs.
Lest we forget it references long
centuries-value of history.

Vast open stretches ripple
ferociously under the dark
winter sky, the water an angry
grey reflection of the upper
atmosphere that informs
its tempestuous temperament.

On the river's banks immense
old willows and elms spread
their dark, empty branches.
Crows soar the windless
pewter bowl of the lowering
winter sky. On its banks

sit the seat of government, the
country's Gothic-inspired
stone-mounted and Gargoyle-carved
edifice of the Parliament Buildings,
its clock tower steepling the sky.

Just Kidding Around

The well-drained bottle stood on the night table, beside it their two drained glasses from last night. He lay on the bed, naked, splendidly masculine. The early morning light escaping tentatively through the folds of the sheer window draperies illuminated his taut, muscular form. How she’d wanted him. With, it seemed to her, an urgency never before experienced. Something special about this guy and she had been so certain of his response.

She raised herself, resting on an elbow. Watched his slow regular breathing, chest rising in regular motions emphasizing that depression between stomach and chest. She reached over, stroked his groin area. No response. She leaned over him, kissed his forehead. Then slipped her face down over his, leaving kisses along the way. He groaned slightly, turned on his side and she sat up.

She padded over to the bathroom, and back. Insinuated herself beside him, spooned her form into his and gyrated. He mumbled something about feeling hellish. Screw that, she told herself. She turned back to face him, nuzzled his chin. No response. A little playful game might help, she told herself. She slid off the bed and passed into her kitchen. A little jab, she said to herself, selecting one of the knives in the drawer. That would make him sit up. They’d laugh, a joke. He would find it amusing, he would tease her for the level of her determination.

She’d loved it when a former lover had whispered to her how mad he was for her ‘raven’ hair. Now that was odd, made him kind of stand out since most of the men she’d been with hadn’t hesitated to rave about her breasts, her long, curved legs, her satiny-smooth skin. There was even once, briefly, a foot fetishist. She adored having a lover cup her breasts, her buttocks, get really hot beyond self-control. She liked the variety every bit as much as men did, and why shouldn’t she?

She’d known women that even she had admired. And those women were so uncertain of themselves, so enfeebled by the thought that no one would love them for anything but their physical perfection. They wanted to be appreciated for other things. They envisaged themselves being abandoned once youth had lapsed. She’d known others who hadn’t cared, just concerned with making the most of what they had while they had it.

She was in neither camp. She had abundant self-confidence. She was more than prepared to live life her way. Didn’t look forward to anyone telling her how that way should be. It didn’t bother her one iota that there were no marriage prospects, since she wasn’t interested in a permanent relationship. She’d had lovers who were, and who were clearly disappointed to discover their aspirations weren’t met by hers. What did bother her was that, now in her mid-30s, she had to face the fact that there would be fewer modelling assignments coming her way.

Not that she looked her age; anything but. She was graceful, slim, her skin endowed still with that dewy freshness that exemplified youth. The hair, her gleaming black hair, it was the only traitor. When she brushed it back off her forehead, off the sides of her head, she noted emerging grey. She’d hardly visualized having to colour her hair so soon, and she resented that.

He was obviously younger than her. After he’d revealed his age - a casual revelation relating to his recent MBA graduation, she just let him go on thinking her age matched his. She’d never before met a man with thick, curling eyelashes, wavy dark hair against a dark, smooth complexion and perfectly symmetrical facial features. He seemed as casually unaware of the effect his appearance had on others as she tried so hard to project, herself.

First time she’d seen him there, and she’d been there often enough. Often enough that she felt comfortable, relaxed about approaching him. Gratified to see the usual response lighting his eyes. They talked, shared a few more drinks, and she invited him to her apartment. They walked, it wasn’t all that far, and it was a pleasant, early fall evening. There was a cooling breeze, they kicked dried leaves off the path as they entered the park close to her apartment. She remembered talking about her regret at leaving university, even though at the time she felt it was the right thing to do for herself.

He was easy to talk to, didn’t seem to feel at all awkward, as so many guys did, being with someone like her. They always, at first, treated her like a porcelain doll. As though they couldn’t believe their luck, picking up this dish. Gloating at envious glances. Other guys watching them as they left. Where to? Well, mostly back to her apartment.

It was a nice apartment, in a good part of town. But then money was no object. Apart from what she earned there was always her family; father to be precise. Her mother constantly worried about her daughter’s finances, knowing nothing of her former husband's generosity. She always told her mother that her finances were her own business and she divulged nothing about her savings, let alone what her social life was like.

Her mother hadn’t exactly been the very best mentor. At least that’s what her father had always hurled at her mother. As though she’d have been different if her exposure to her parents’ lives had been different. Fact was, they knew absolutely nothing about her, and she preferred it that way.

All those years, oblivious to her needs as a kid, now they’re suddenly there when they’re no longer needed. Her father sending those regular guilt-assuaging cheques. Her mother’s irritating calls to tell her how lonely she was. Guess the young studs weren’t quite as available. Move in with her? Not likely, not bloody likely.

“But dear, you don’t have to work!” her mother complained. "You don't have to live there."

“But Mother, I love my work. Why would I give it up?”

“Virginia, you love being noticed, you love flaunting yourself. Modelling isn’t the only way you can achieve that satisfaction”.

Now that infuriated her, that her mother would make the assumption that what motivated her also did her daughter. There was more to her than that. She had a brain, she could think for herself, make responsible decisions. Unlike her mother whom her father always upbraided for being a brainless twit.

Besides which, she’d had a tutor in personal relationships, one who took an interest in her. Who’d given her that encouraging start in making choices. She was thirteen when her father raged and threatened her mother over her truly stupid indiscretions. He’d never bothered when she slept around with men he didn’t know. It seemed to bother him when she had had a month-long fling with the son of one of his business partners.

Uncle Geoff made her feel a whole lot better. About herself. About everything, all the shit that went down in her life. He was really good about it. She was the one in control, not him. If she said stop, or not now, he'd never press her.

It was only natural he’d be the one she would call.

“Geoff, it’s something awful, horrible, I don’t even know how to tell you”, she babbled, words running together.

“Gilly” he said, in that cool detached way he had, “pull yourself together. I can hear you’re in trouble, but I can’t help if I don’t know what’s happened. Try again. Talk slowly, take a big breath, and get everything together”, he ordered in his sane way. The kind of controlled saneness that got him where he sat today, a government bigwig.

She shuddered, forced back her panic, breathed heavily, and sighed relief. “Right”, she said. “I’ll give it a go”. And she explained in rushed sentences, with pauses between each, to give her time to put her thoughts together, trying to inform him in such a manner that he might not outright condemn her for stupidity.

“Geoff, I’ve got this guy in my bed. I invited him. I really liked him. I was preparing for a good time. We were going to have really great sex. And we did, we had a great time… You know… ” Her long pause brought an encouraging response.

“All right, Gilly, so what’s wrong? What happened? He’s still there?”

“Yes. Yes, he is. He’s still here. He … he’s dead, Geoff”.

“Dead? What do you mean? Some young guy, and he’s dead? What happened?”

“I … I … I don’t know how to say this, Geoff. It was an accident, I can’t remember how it happened. I had this knife, see, and I thought I would just fool around, prod him with it. He was lying in my bed, doing nothing. I couldn’t get him aroused. I was confused, Geoff.”

“Confused?” Ginny, you were pissed off? Were you drinking?”

“Yes, that’s it. We were drinking. We met in that pub over the way, you know, the one I took you to last time you were here?”

“Okay, Gin, take it easy, you’re starting to sound a little hysterical. What happened?”

“What … happened? I guess I kind of lost it. I don’t remember, but that must have been what happened.”

“Lost it. All right. You were angry-drunk. You’re sure he’s dead? Did you try to take a pulse?”

“He’s dead! I know he is … he’s dead. What do I do?”

“Now listen carefully, Ginny. I’m not sure what happened with you. And it’s fairly clear that you don’t quite know either. You were drunk, not in full possession of your faculties. That’s kind of extenuating … circumstances.”

“Yes!”, she sobbed. “I don’t know what happened, I really liked the guy. I didn’t mean to hurt him. It was like that knife had a life of its own. I just meant to kind of poke it at him, gently, you know? I did, I just touched him with it. He sat up, looked at me with those big deer eyes, I could see he was fearful. Geoff, that made me feel kind of good, seeing him like that. I guess I must’ve just kept going.”

“Kept going? You mean you really stabbed him. Where?”

“Um, oh God, this is horrible, I can’t take it. This is killing me”, she sobbed.

“Where, Ginny, where did you stab him? Get yourself together. C’mon, let’s hear it.”

“In … in his chest. I guess in his chest. Maybe a little lower down, too. More than once, you know?”

“I see. Now listen to me, listen carefully. You’ve said you don’t remember.”

“Yes, I don’t, not really. I must’ve blanked out for a minute or two. When I came to, I saw him lying there, blood oozing. He wasn’t breathing. His chest was absolutely still. His eyes were still open. He still looked scared. It was horrible. It is horrible, he’s still there!”, she lapsed again into sobs.

“Ginny, now listen. First thing, don’t touch anything. Leave everything the way it is. Leave him alone, don’t touch him.”

“As though I would! I couldn’t touch him if I wanted to!”, she cried.

“Ginny, stop that. You can’t afford to be hysterical. Here’s what I want you to do. Call 911.”

“911?”

“Yes, just as soon as you’re off the phone with me. I’ll be coming … no, I can’t. You can’t let it be known that you spoke with me. You’ve got to let it appear as though the first thing you did when you became totally aware of what happened, his condition ... that you dialled emergency. Call them, and it’s all right if you sound a little out of it when you do, because that’s understandable. Under the circumstances.”

“All right Geoff, I’ll do that. And then what do I do, what do I tell them?”

“You’ll tell them everything, everything you told me. Emphasize your grief. Make certain they’re aware of your … innocence of intent. That it was an accident. You're utterly distraught, contrite, horribly upset. That you hadn’t intended to kill the guy. He’s nude, you said?”

“Yes, he is, yes. We were making love. Only it didn’t happen. That’s why, I guess … “

“Never mind that!” he said sharply. Don’t speculate about why you reacted as you did. Just describe the situation. The knife, where was it? In the kitchen? Say you brought it into the bedroom for a practical purpose.”

“Practical? Like to use it for something else? Like kind of to pry the cork out of a wine bottle kind of?”

“That’s my girl! That’ll do nicely. That’s your story. Got it?”

“Yes, I’ve got it. Geoff, thanks. You know I wouldn’t go to anyone else for advice. Geoff, it’s horrible. I must be a monster to have done something like that! I feel awful. He’s got parents, he’s only a kid, he’s only 20. What’ll I say to them?”

“One thing at a time, kiddo. Just play it as it goes. First call emergency. Then you’ll have to deal with the police. There’s plenty of time before you’ll have to face his parents. That’ll likely occur in court.”

“Court? In court?”

“Ginny, there’ll be a trial. Sorry kid, but you’ll have to go through with that. There’s no way this can be covered up. Someone’s dead. You killed the guy. But ... there’s extenuating circumstances, you’ve got to play that card.”

“Yes, right”, she said.