The Sleeping Wall

The Sleeping Wall
Lift and pull of paddle. Wind at their backs. A raccoon’s churring knifes through her. The
boys pass the thermos. She watched James kneel between their beds, a supplicant. He
touched their foreheads and they stirred in sleep.
Mother always held my hand. I remember that one thing most. Walking through fields, the
distant line of drumlins changing color with the light. My hand warm in hers. The rustle of her
skirts.
The wind ceases. Cold stills them. Philip’s red mittens. Michael’s scarf wrapped round and
round. Wine in a flask. Night washes over them. The canoe, for a moment, motionless,
hangs on time. Fish numbed by winter’s last breath. Limb of birch, blind sentinels.
5
His hands on the steering wheel. Past the crossroads, moss-patched houses. Porches
strewn with pine needles. Snow on the windshield, the highway hurtling toward the horizon.
Taste of Mai. Dim light spreads over sloping hills. Snowflakes spiral.
Huett’s water raked by wind. The untouched piano. Medina’s musky scent on every surface. Her
hair black orchids or ravens. He can’t bear to touch her. He can’t bear not to touch her. Mornings,
he wakes like a crazy man.
Left onto Route 9, past fields cold in the encroaching dark. He searches the glove box for
a tape hidden behind wadded Kleenex, a child’s plastic gun. Mai had turned, exposing the
thin skin of her neck. He’d filled her mouth with his fingers.
The iron bed with chipped white paint. Medina’s bracelets on the dresser, cold silver reflections in
the mirror. Her way of lifting her hair exposing a web of veins pulsing at her temples.
At the crossroads, an animal’s eyes, ovals of hard reflected light. His secret life is an affliction.
His students look at him with open mouths. He takes comfort from nothing. Only
his sons. Only Mai who smells of plums.
An owl sweeps over the road. He thinks of his sons running, always running, through
forests of birch. Appearing, disappearing behind white columns. Flickering children in a
movie that spins round on a reel.
Medina at the end of the dock, a child on either side. They turn toward him. Wall of water. The
horizon. Molten metal below. Above, falling fire.
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