The Boat in the Evening (5 page)

One deludes oneself daily.

I felt achingly hollow and destitute when I came this way over the marsh in the morning chill. What is it that glimmers now? Is it something for that void?

There is still movement.

As long as the dance lasts.

The difficult knot will not loosen; it has not been torn apart by the pressure. That is not why the cranes are dancing in any case. They are not dancing it away, they are showing it to one another. One cannot see through the tangles anywhere. Not yet.

Part of oneself lying numb in the moisture, feeling stabs of heat elsewhere, burning with impatience.

Must I find out more?

About what?

Oh, there are so many things.

The cranes intensify this feeling. One can always find out more. As long as the mirrored head or the upright head is above the surface. As long as one manages to travel across floating, shivering tussocks one can find out more.

From these bewitched birds one can find out more.

*

If only one could give them a message about this, telling them to dance more and to dance differently. Very differently. They look as if they can do it.

With my chin buried in the moss I wish to the nearest one that is rising and falling: Gome closer. Gome close.

Boldly they reveal themselves in the dance. They reveal their harrowed and astonished bird minds so that one is in no doubt. Come closer.

They do not come immediately in obedience to my intense wish. There was not enough force behind it for that. They are moving on hanging tussocks, feeling the ground give way and urge them on to more frenzied gestures. If they were to drift over here, it is not likely to be on account of my intense wish.

But a stream of wishes is directed at them from the boy with his face half buried in the marsh. The sight of them makes one confused. No one can shout and no one sing with his mouth in the marsh, but some kind of intuitive contact has been made all the same.

They come closer. The nearest one is not so very far away.

Several of them have paused, their heads lifted high on their long necks, looking inquiringly about them. Sharp-eyed as they are, they must have noticed the object in the moss again.

Does he no longer startle them? He can well believe it might be so.

Are they coming here?

No, they are turning away.

Nothing to bother about, on their wild, joyous day. They are still possessed by the dance.

But the nearest one seems curious all the same. It intends to come this way, stepping tentatively on the thin tussocks. It moves gradually in this direction, its head lifted high.

Another one notices this, and follows, cautiously and a little anxiously.

All the others resume the dance. Some of them have not even paused. Only these two are still looking this way.

Shall I call to it?

No, it would be gone at once.

As it is, they are approaching through the stagnant puddles. The birds are walking towards this strange object in the marsh that they noticed a long time ago, that does not move, that they are inquisitive about, and that does not threaten them.

They pause a short distance away. They were born shy. Heads higher than ever.

This is the spot; they will not come closer. But they are really very close; I can see right into their eyes. Then one stops whispering wishes, they might notice. Just concentrate on the nearest one, the one that really did come of its own accord.

A feeling comes over me that now there are nothing but eyes above the marsh. A thought creeps in, how extraordinary this must look: a pair of eyes sticking up out of the moss like two stalks—and nothing more.

Nothing is moving at this spot now. All movement is over there, here it has petrified. How far from me are they? Five or six paces. Right beside me.

I certainly shan't beg them to come closer now. The proud head is lifted high on guard, a beam of light strikes straight out of the eye that is turned towards me. Straight towards me without blinking, and thus we are petrified.

*

Do I know what is coming from that wide-open eye? No. It could be anything at all; it could very well be fear. No, it is not fear. The bird may have been shy, but it has overcome that now. One can probably read surprise in it, surprise at anything strange. Is there any kind of understanding? No.

Desperately I latch on to the remote possibility that some kind of understanding is radiating from the bird after all. We understood each other completely during the dance.

Nonsense!

But I so desperately want it to be understanding. A proud, alien bird—does anyone know of all that may reside in it?

I look it straight in the eye. I look at its tall elegance. It looks at my stalk-eyes in the moss.

At last the bird does something: it turns and looks at me from a slightly different direction.

The enormous wings are at rest alongside its body. One thinks of its wing span as a resting wind, always ready.

It is the eye that rivets me. I am sure it is asking me certain questions. But mine are probably asking more. My smarting eyes that are sticking out of the moss on stalks.

But I have seen the dance of the cranes, I say to the searching, slightly arrogant eye. What did I not see there? I ask uselessly. The eye is so clear, so clear, and utterly superior. No one saw how it was during the dance.

The crane does not stir. Now the other also approaches stepping high, and pauses beside the first. Both of them equally close to the creature in the moss and the windcheater.

They are equally tall. Each turns one eye towards me, full of light.

But they have no explanation to give me. That was something I invented in my perplexity. They do not help me. They are big and secure and shy. Yet the disquieting dance is within them, ready to be unleashed. The dance that still continues over there on the marsh.

The dance that it was so easy to share.

Their eyes are tranquil lights resting on me, without any message.

Come closer, I beg them once more, from somewhere deep within me. I am lying in the wet marsh. My heart is pounding against the raw tussocks. It is good and painful, both at the same time.

They still seem to think they are close enough, standing in their wonderment or whatever it may be. I do not move a muscle, do not lift my face, am nothing but protruding eyes. They are not afraid, but they are careful to have their wings open ready, just in case. I can't help wondering if they have a line of communication open to me? I can only hope that it is so. An open channel, where we can search for the mystery we share while we walk in the marshes and on the earth.

The light in the eye is without expression, I now decide. But then I start, for they suddenly take a few paces towards me, and have come so close that I could seize the long, sinewy leg of the bird if I stretched out my arm.

I do not attempt it. There was a hint of unfriendliness in their movements. Again I cannot help thinking that they could easily put an end to me on the spot if they wished. If they were to begin, the entire savage flock would storm in this direction. If these two were to shriek a warning to the others it would be over in a moment.

They must not come closer, for then they would trample on me. They do not. I am lying stock-still as if lifeless.

But I have seen something, seen them in their naked dance—and I manage to stare at them fixedly, trying to keep looking into their eyes. If I were to look down they would perhaps attack, since the change from wonderment to hostility occurred so quickly.

They must not come closer. Nor must they give warning. Their shriek is horrible and can start a chain reaction in the others. And yet—I want them here, even though my body is tortured and freezing. I say behind my closed mouth: Please. Don't go. Don't go for a long time. I must see it all. Don't go. Do something that will frighten me, if you like, but don't go.

As if in answer to this the second bird makes a leap into the air, is airborne and fans its wings wide. Huge. Buoyant. All is air and movement and freedom. It has been wheeling above rushing rows of countries. It is probably only doing this because it is tired of standing still; it will not take off for good. And it settles at once and becomes as still as before.

The first one stands watching me in the same position. It is becoming a struggle to have that unmoving eye on me, feeling as if I have to answer it the whole time. Soon I shan't know what to do.

The marsh has a painful grip on me. I am soaking wet and feel heavy as a stone. The thoughts that awoke during our dance—about knots that would unravel and be illuminated—can no longer be sustained. The huge pair of wings that gave their display—they raised my spirits a little, but not enough, not even enough to get my chin up out of the moss. What are they going to do now?

Having shown me what wings and air are, they stand in silent inspection. I can hold out no longer; I must do something, no matter what.

*

And yet I am still wishing, Stay! as I know that this must come to an end.

What am I thinking of? Haven't I been able to share in far more than I could ever have imagined?

But I can see that we are no longer speaking to each other in any way. They are merely inspecting me with their round bird eyes. Mine are beginning to swim. I cannot hold out. Something must be done at once. There is a long crane's foot within an arm's length—they must have edged even closer—and I shoot up out of the moss, becoming more than two eyes, throw out an arm and seize the hard, tall stalk of a leg—and at last I shriek my own shriek at this unyielding enigma.

The shriek must have been lying in my throat all the time; it came of itself.

The effect follows like lightning.

The bird starts on being seized by the leg, and shrieks a reply to my shriek before it has died away—a horrible sound. Like lightning it strikes at me with its giant beak, slashing a strip of fire down my face in its haste.

I lie prone, expecting to be slashed again. The bird does not do it. It makes its departing leap, easily jerking itself away from my half-hearted grip, becomes airborne, fans out all of that sweeping freedom and sails in low flight down to the dancers. Its companion leaps and takes off just as quickly.

The dancing cranes stop instantly on hearing the shriek. All of them take to the air. The sky is a dark seething of crane wings. Soon the whole flock is high in the sky, heading towards another familiar place, another marsh. Until their own has been cleansed.

*

For a while we were moving towards each other in some strange channel.

The blood from the gash in my face trickles down on to my jacket. The blood in my veins prickles and tingles like ants in my numbed body. Unsteadily I lean over a puddle to wash. Elsewhere a particle of shame is smarting because of my behaviour towards those shy creatures.

3

Spring in Winter

The air was full of wet snowflakes, but that didn't matter. Everything was just as it should be; it was a beautiful evening.

A cluster of houses stood there, not large enough to be called a town. The houses had been laid out one by one, without any overall plan, and for this reason there were many unexpected alleys and comers.

Over this a snowstorm was sweeping. At the narrow comers the mild snowfall met the strong light from the outdoor lamps, and seemed to turn it whiter than white.

And the whiteness poured down into the comers incessantly. The snow near the lamps was trackless. People were indoors.

*

But not all of them. Out of doors someone was happy on account of the beautiful evening. A short girl was standing close to the wall in the shadow. Or half-shadow, for the mingled snow and lamplight were so strong that the shadows were weakened.

The girl must have been standing there for quite a while; her footprints had been wiped out. She might have tumbled straight out of the night sky.

The girl stood motionless. You could almost believe she was here simply to be snowed under in this lonely place—but she must have had other reasons for coming to stand here glittering.

Snowed under? No, I can't get snowed under, she thought with a bubble of joy. That dark, hard man of iron over there on his block of stone—he can be snowed under, he probably will be snowed under. I can only get warmer and warmer.

The snow won't settle on me, she thought, but if it does, that's all right.

In the meantime the wet flakes fell thickly and heavily on to her shoulders and on to the boyish cap she was wearing on the back of her head, and wherever it found the slightest basis for piling itself up. She already had small drifts of it on her here and there.

Of course the snow is settling on me, she thought when she noticed this. Why shouldn't it? I mustn't move, she thought. I want it like this. Not to be snowed under, but I'll look different, and that's what I want. Everything's different this evening.

He shall see me like this, different, when he comes to meet me.