packages of pasture. I had always held England against itself. Come on now, look. A spiral of smoke at the horizon. Landscape. See a forky road cut the fields. There was yellow, green. Pleasure in it. Enough. Let me settle for a gentle obscurity. Constable, Mahesh said, considering me. Yes, I agreed, beaten, Constable.
31
We Like Sheep. Aurora sings Handel up to the lab We Like Sheep, Kid, unlocking the door, We Like Sheep. Singing the way inside Have Gone Astray then not singing saying, Mother says Newmarket This Year so she has to remind Aurora halfway through that she has no idea what Newmarket is, getting out a new sponge tearing at the plastic with her teeth. Aurora winds her hair into a ball, jabs it through with a knitting needle. I stole this from Lucille in the sewing rooms. Looloo. I should have been a better rider, Kid then I would be at Newmarket right now instead of in a chemistry lab then Philippa would be cheering me on wouldn’t she? Yes, she says, Philippa would be cheering you on Philippa who is Philippa and Aurora laughs and says, You’re a funny girl the way you say things like that God you make me laugh. I told you how she bought me a horse when I was twelve. You know it’s my mother. Rinsing, Who has your horse now, Aurora? Nobody, Aurora says, Well God. He had to be shot on account of a stableboy leaving a pitchfork in the wrong place. Aurora fights the faucet. They sacked the boy but shot my horse. Then Aurora gets quiet her hair in that big sad ball. The sound of running water. Too bad they couldn’t shoot the boy, she tells Aurora to make her smile. Aurora won’t look up. They shoot a horse to put it out of his misery.
Pestles bob in the filled sink. Yesterday they were out on the field watching sports the three of them. Four. Four, because Simon Puck—
Beakboy? . . . asks Aurora.
Yes. Puck is always there.
You know you talk about these friends, Kid . . . Aurora takes a pestle to dry . . . Yet you always seem to be alone.
We were out there the four of us. Sophie wouldn’t stop talking about the good the true and the beautiful until Brickie snapped that the wonder was really working his nerves so Sophie shut up and began drawing sulky pyramids in the dirt.
Not much of a yarn so far . . . Aurora’s reaching up, stacking dishes.
Silence for a while then Brickie said So these are the golden days I’ve heard so much about. Sophie dug at her pyramid, Golden seconds more like. Well Brickie was annoyed and Sophie was grumping This too will last, so to rouse good humor yes an effort at levity I shouted To hell with old Stokes that Cyclops I don’t need some piece of metal and glass to take snapshots. Indeed said Brickie eyes searching Photos or no he quoted up from under his bastard fringe It’s guaranteed we’ll haunt each other over the next half century.
He said no such thing . . . Aurora disappears in search of toxins.
In the spin of autumn’s tiny helicopters I will see you as you are now, though you too will be fifty, seventy, tedious of life, unfit for dreams.
I plan to die at thirty. This from Sophie. I have no use for being my mother the inconsequential worries of
I will be
You won’t remember, Catrine.
Will.
When you glance up through a net of trees like these, in a crosshatched American sky you’ll find us sprawled under chestnuts watching cricket.
Well it was hockey they ignored and it was too wet to sprawl so they crouched on wooden pallets but who was to argue the more beautiful rendering.
32
So he calls her an original. In his dining room, bringing her to the shuttered room she never saw the day it snowed the day she leaned in his kitchen doorway as he fussed to make her toast. Says it when he picks up his palette knife says it once more when she sighs from holding her head still for so long. You Are.
Found on a bench looking out at Sunday evening on the cricket pitch back from a weekend at the new house. He said, In early February you were the one I expected
31
We Like Sheep. Aurora sings Handel up to the lab We Like Sheep, Kid, unlocking the door, We Like Sheep. Singing the way inside Have Gone Astray then not singing saying, Mother says Newmarket This Year so she has to remind Aurora halfway through that she has no idea what Newmarket is, getting out a new sponge tearing at the plastic with her teeth. Aurora winds her hair into a ball, jabs it through with a knitting needle. I stole this from Lucille in the sewing rooms. Looloo. I should have been a better rider, Kid then I would be at Newmarket right now instead of in a chemistry lab then Philippa would be cheering me on wouldn’t she? Yes, she says, Philippa would be cheering you on Philippa who is Philippa and Aurora laughs and says, You’re a funny girl the way you say things like that God you make me laugh. I told you how she bought me a horse when I was twelve. You know it’s my mother. Rinsing, Who has your horse now, Aurora? Nobody, Aurora says, Well God. He had to be shot on account of a stableboy leaving a pitchfork in the wrong place. Aurora fights the faucet. They sacked the boy but shot my horse. Then Aurora gets quiet her hair in that big sad ball. The sound of running water. Too bad they couldn’t shoot the boy, she tells Aurora to make her smile. Aurora won’t look up. They shoot a horse to put it out of his misery.
Pestles bob in the filled sink. Yesterday they were out on the field watching sports the three of them. Four. Four, because Simon Puck—
Beakboy? . . . asks Aurora.
Yes. Puck is always there.
You know you talk about these friends, Kid . . . Aurora takes a pestle to dry . . . Yet you always seem to be alone.
We were out there the four of us. Sophie wouldn’t stop talking about the good the true and the beautiful until Brickie snapped that the wonder was really working his nerves so Sophie shut up and began drawing sulky pyramids in the dirt.
Not much of a yarn so far . . . Aurora’s reaching up, stacking dishes.
Silence for a while then Brickie said So these are the golden days I’ve heard so much about. Sophie dug at her pyramid, Golden seconds more like. Well Brickie was annoyed and Sophie was grumping This too will last, so to rouse good humor yes an effort at levity I shouted To hell with old Stokes that Cyclops I don’t need some piece of metal and glass to take snapshots. Indeed said Brickie eyes searching Photos or no he quoted up from under his bastard fringe It’s guaranteed we’ll haunt each other over the next half century.
He said no such thing . . . Aurora disappears in search of toxins.
In the spin of autumn’s tiny helicopters I will see you as you are now, though you too will be fifty, seventy, tedious of life, unfit for dreams.
I plan to die at thirty. This from Sophie. I have no use for being my mother the inconsequential worries of
I will be
You won’t remember, Catrine.
Will.
When you glance up through a net of trees like these, in a crosshatched American sky you’ll find us sprawled under chestnuts watching cricket.
Well it was hockey they ignored and it was too wet to sprawl so they crouched on wooden pallets but who was to argue the more beautiful rendering.
32
So he calls her an original. In his dining room, bringing her to the shuttered room she never saw the day it snowed the day she leaned in his kitchen doorway as he fussed to make her toast. Says it when he picks up his palette knife says it once more when she sighs from holding her head still for so long. You Are.
Found on a bench looking out at Sunday evening on the cricket pitch back from a weekend at the new house. He said, In early February you were the one I expected
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