Like Water on Stone (6 page)

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Authors: Dana Walrath

BOOK: Like Water on Stone
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Shahen
Papa tells me that the secret of the sound
is in the right hand
and the pick,
the
mizrap
.
Papa tells me that mystery and power
come in through the quill,
that eagles were with us
long before Christ.
Papa tells me to hold it light and loose
between my fingertips, hand and wrist fluid,
like bubbling water, to let the supple quill pull
music from each pair of strings.
Again, Papa tells me a good Armenian carries
the music of home close to his heart, wherever he is.
If he lets me go,
I will.
Papa tells me to let the
oud
belly touch my own,
to tuck its side into my right elbow, its neck resting
in my left hand, two melon bellies touching,
yes.
Papa tells me to make my left hand fierce.
Fingers like hammers
press into metal
for song.
Papa tells me it only hurts at first.
Calluses will form with time.
Then my fingers will dance on the strings,
the way my brothers danced across the rooftop
before the Ottomans entered the war,
fighting with Germany,
against Russia, England,
and France.
Papa does not tell me that the Turks blame us,
the Christians, as their Empire rots and shrinks.
All this I learned
for myself.
Sosi
Mama and I worked the dough
with sweet fresh flour from the mill.
Anahid brought news today
not of war,
not of Vahan,
though the news was for me,
only me.
She whispered it,
poured it right into my ear
while Mama worked the
tonir
,
dropping sheets of dough
onto the clay surface
of the underground oven
she had built.
I kept my face as still as glass.
Her secret’s safe with me.
She’s not sure,
not completely.
Thunder clouds don’t always give rain,
you know.
But I know.
Her rosy lips and cheeks know, too.
They are proof that next spring,
after the pink buds of apricots
burst into bloom,
after the small, hard fruits first form,
and then blush sweet and ripe,
their scent spreading
through the whole valley,
I will be an auntie.
Shahen
Fall persimmons ripened,
but I stayed small.
Cold came down from mountaintops.
Still I have not grown.
Young Turks will fight the Russian troops
and still my face is smooth.
Armenian men will join the Turks;
so say the new laws.
Troops prepare for eastern fronts
at Erzerum so near.
But Papa only plays the
oud
.
I say to him after a song,
“Turkish guns will turn on us.
You must let me go.
“Misak and Kevorg too.
Soon they’ll be the age to serve.”
The
oud
between us,
my callused fingers tough,
my voice too high,
my face too like a girl’s.
Papa will not listen.
Sosi
I meet Anahid at the market.
No belly bulge of baby
shows below her coat.
But I know.
“Let’s shop for a clock,”
she says, eyes bright,
her lips and cheeks
pomegranate-red.
She tells
baron
Arkalian
the clock will be a present
for her husband’s mother, Palewan.
He stiffens ever so slightly
at this mention of a Kurd,
but a master craftsman
shows his wares to all.
He shows Anahid
the fine details
of painted faces,
the inner workings
of the gears,
and the glistening polish
of the wooden frame.
From across the shop,
Vahan looks to me.
Baron
Arkalian brings us
to Vahan’s bench
to show us the finest brushes,
made from three cat whiskers
aligned just so they can make
a tapering line.
Vahan is so close
that my skin shimmers
as though the brush
makes lines on me.
Ardziv
Cold came. Leaves fell.
Snakes stayed in caves
for their winter sleep.
No one worked on rooftops.
Each day my search
for beast or bird
took me far
from the music
of home.
Winter days,
as I rose higher,
I saw soldiers
by the thousands
climbing snow-clad slopes
and forging cold mud valleys,
swarming the rocks
like an angry herd.
Identical
kabalak
helmets
made their heads
look swollen,
like beasts
instead of
humans.
From farther east,
train cars filled with soldiers,
clad in coats like bears,
landed at a fort
and began to fight the others.
One day, as I looked back toward home,
I caught a glimpse of Shahen
descending toward the river.
I flapped and soared,
helped by the wind
to arrive at the river’s edge,
where a group of boys, almost men,
the same ones he swam with in summer,
including the one with the toothy grin,
called him traitor as he passed.
“Go to Russia!
That’s where you belong,
greedy Christian traitor!”
Shahen did not shrink or hide.
He stood as tall as he could
with his small size,
his voice still high like Sosi’s.
“I will leave you all
in the dust
when I go
to America.”
Sosi
Long, cold months,
I work at the loom inside,
with Vahan’s note tucked under the loom
so its words flow through me as I weave.
“Like the nightingale, I warbled round my rose
with wings displayed.”
Five hands more
will make this carpet done,
this carpet for my dowry,
with colors from my heart,
though our fathers haven’t spoken
not with the war, not with Vahan
almost old enough to serve.
Misak, too, who was foolish enough
to cheer when the law was changed
so Armenians could serve
in the Ottoman army.
Inside the pattern of diamonds and leaves,
I’ve knotted birds into full fearless flight.
Others perch on branches, feet clasping tight.
One lies still, in her neat rush nest,
three blue eggs below her warm body.
She’s plump, this bird, like Anahid,
with a calm and glowing full-moon face.
I made her here, smiling with me,
not scared of those who’d turn on her
because she’s one of us.
For now she must be nothing but
the good pregnant wife
of a Kurdish soldier.
I start a new bird who dreams as he sleeps.
He lies on his side, eyes closed, his red chest tucked
between a blanket of wings, his beak tilted up.
My knots make him seem more dead than dreaming.
Perhaps birds dream only when they fly.
Mama forbids me to take out the rows.
It wastes good wool, she says,
and mistakes make the next carpet better.
But I take out each knot
with a small knife
hiding the fistful of
rich red wool
deep in my pocket.
“Take the knife and slay me straight away,”
says the poet Sayat Nova.
Mama will never know.
Shahen
On frosty nights, paperlike sheets of ice
form where stones
block the stream’s flow.
I pry them up, the icy shapes,
so like states on maps,
and shatter them on the rock.
Morning music for my walk
to Father Manoog.
Our stream flows strong
from winter snow and rain.
Its rushing sound fills my ears
and blocks the steps of soldiers,
four of them, who appear on the banks
pointing their guns, saying,
“You, boy. Take me to the
gavour
miller.”
I obey, knowing Papa and my brothers
are already at work.
Soldiers storm inside, shouting,
“Surrender your arms!”
Misak stops the millstones.
Kevorg steps back against the wall.
Papa takes one step toward them,
his arms out at chest height, palms up,
as though he is in church.
“What arms?” Papa asks them.
“We millers have no need for arms.”
Gentle Papa opens every door and chest,
hiding nothing but his limp.
Soldiers dump out bins of clean white flour
and whole wheat berries onto the earthen floor.
They rake it with their guns.
“We millers have no need for arms,”
Papa says as they poke him
toward the door of our attached house.
They tear Mama’s blankets.
They take our copper bowls.
They dump her food from pots and jars
and tell us, “We will be back tomorrow.
If you do not give us your weapons then,
limp and all, we will arrest you.”
After they leave, Papa sends me to Mustafa
for a weapon to surrender in the morning.
We millers have a need for weapons.
Sosi
Armenians of the age to serve
now build the Baghdad Railway.
One straight Turkish German line
from Constantinople
to the oil fields of Basra.
From paintbrush
to sledgehammer,
this cannot be for Vahan.
Or my brothers, either,
though Shahen’s far too small to serve.
The Ottomans sent Asan
to fight at the Russian front.
But other Kurds,
the thieves released from jails,
join roving bands called
chetes
.
Ardziv
Before the days
became longer than nights,
everywhere I flew
there was war.
Sharklike ships
burned through
the Black Sea.
The Mediterranean
and the Red,
the same.
Fires blazed in the Suez.
Ships left the ocean
to enter the wide, sandy mouth
of the Euphrates,
laying anchor by smokestacks
of Persian oil fields.
The earth itself
seemed to fear.
Bulbs kept hidden
under the earth.
Sheep were late
with lambs.
Ground squirrels
stayed in dens.
But then the days got longer.
Brave apricots pushed out their blooms.
Rooftop life began again.
The mill wheel still made music.

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