caeli et universae potestates,
throbbed across the silence of the snow-covered rocks. Dusk falls hard and short in winter, and as I approached the house the stiff, rising arpeggios of the hymn of praise drowned out even the loud crunch of my own boots on the dry snow. Staccato strings like bells pierced the gathering dark. I walked slowly, listening, freezing, and I saton the back porch until I finally heard the men’s
Miserere nostri, Domine.
Their deep voices were joined by the soaring violins which gave way to the women’s
In te, Domine, speravi,
nudging the music toward its final
amen
and
sanctus.
Through the back door window I could see my mother sitting in the dark kitchen, her elbows on the table, her hands wrapped round a cup of tea, staring into dead air, absorbed in the sound.
Pushing open the door, I mouthed to her, “A little loud!” covering my ears.
“I like it loud. I feel like a slug on the conductor’s baton.”
Her cheeks were gaunt, as if that very afternoon the disease had eaten her away a little more, shrinking her before my eyes. I stomped the dry snow off my boots and dropped my heavy coat over a chair.
“Can I turn it down?”
She shrugged.
“You had it on so loud I could hear it at the barns.”
“Well, I’m sure your elephants would like it. How’s Lear?”
“He’s all right.”
“You’ll appreciate Pärt when you get older.”
“I already do.”
“You won’t until you’re as old as me.”
“Come on! Was Alecto by today?”
“No.”
“He hasn’t been around for a few days. I wonder where he goes.”
“No point wondering . . . those kind of men never bother telling you.”
“Where’s Lottie?”
“She had to leave early. I told her to go.”
I poured myself a cup of tea and cut off a big slice of store-bought coffee cake. We ate badly in the winter. We survived on eggs and toast, canned beans and soups like two old bachelors. At our last farm, before I’d left home, there’d been a fish man who drove up unexpectedly with his freezer-van full of Boston bluefish and shrimps and rich scallops and occasionally a lobster. My extravagant mother bought bags of it, just because he came door to door, and we feasted for a few nights on rice and seafood. The rest of it sat buried in the freezer getting freezer burn. In the summers we always had sprawling, unkempt gardens with lettuces and tomatoes and bushels of beans. We ate lots of fresh salads. But my mother’s freezer was empty this winter. I could see that she hadn’t had a garden, and I wondered how long she’d really been ill.
“Want to see something interesting?” I said, devouring my cake.
I pulled some of Saba’s sketches out of my knapsack and laid them on the table. Then I went to the front hall closet where I’d been keeping the others. I sorted them and laid them down in the order they’d been done, the one made against me first. It had dark blotches at the beginnings of the lines where Saba had fiddled with her marker before moving it, and the excited scribble over both lines. The last drawing,one Saba had done that afternoon, was spare, just an arc across the top third of the page with a single line intersecting it.
My mother looked at them curiously and lifted up first one, then another. She passed her thin hands over the table and looked some more.
“Who did these?”
“One of the elephants, the baby.”
She laid down the page she was holding and picked up the last one.
“It takes a cultured sensibility to appreciate a line,” she said critically. “The little genius appears to have a good sense of balance. If one of my students had done these I’d say there was happiness and intention in these lines.”
“They remind me of those endless Asian bamboos.”
She laughed. “Or de Kooning. . . . What does your elephant man say?”
“His name’s Jo.”
“What does he say?”
“He hasn’t seen them. I just do them with the elephants on my own.”
“And Dr.
throbbed across the silence of the snow-covered rocks. Dusk falls hard and short in winter, and as I approached the house the stiff, rising arpeggios of the hymn of praise drowned out even the loud crunch of my own boots on the dry snow. Staccato strings like bells pierced the gathering dark. I walked slowly, listening, freezing, and I saton the back porch until I finally heard the men’s
Miserere nostri, Domine.
Their deep voices were joined by the soaring violins which gave way to the women’s
In te, Domine, speravi,
nudging the music toward its final
amen
and
sanctus.
Through the back door window I could see my mother sitting in the dark kitchen, her elbows on the table, her hands wrapped round a cup of tea, staring into dead air, absorbed in the sound.
Pushing open the door, I mouthed to her, “A little loud!” covering my ears.
“I like it loud. I feel like a slug on the conductor’s baton.”
Her cheeks were gaunt, as if that very afternoon the disease had eaten her away a little more, shrinking her before my eyes. I stomped the dry snow off my boots and dropped my heavy coat over a chair.
“Can I turn it down?”
She shrugged.
“You had it on so loud I could hear it at the barns.”
“Well, I’m sure your elephants would like it. How’s Lear?”
“He’s all right.”
“You’ll appreciate Pärt when you get older.”
“I already do.”
“You won’t until you’re as old as me.”
“Come on! Was Alecto by today?”
“No.”
“He hasn’t been around for a few days. I wonder where he goes.”
“No point wondering . . . those kind of men never bother telling you.”
“Where’s Lottie?”
“She had to leave early. I told her to go.”
I poured myself a cup of tea and cut off a big slice of store-bought coffee cake. We ate badly in the winter. We survived on eggs and toast, canned beans and soups like two old bachelors. At our last farm, before I’d left home, there’d been a fish man who drove up unexpectedly with his freezer-van full of Boston bluefish and shrimps and rich scallops and occasionally a lobster. My extravagant mother bought bags of it, just because he came door to door, and we feasted for a few nights on rice and seafood. The rest of it sat buried in the freezer getting freezer burn. In the summers we always had sprawling, unkempt gardens with lettuces and tomatoes and bushels of beans. We ate lots of fresh salads. But my mother’s freezer was empty this winter. I could see that she hadn’t had a garden, and I wondered how long she’d really been ill.
“Want to see something interesting?” I said, devouring my cake.
I pulled some of Saba’s sketches out of my knapsack and laid them on the table. Then I went to the front hall closet where I’d been keeping the others. I sorted them and laid them down in the order they’d been done, the one made against me first. It had dark blotches at the beginnings of the lines where Saba had fiddled with her marker before moving it, and the excited scribble over both lines. The last drawing,one Saba had done that afternoon, was spare, just an arc across the top third of the page with a single line intersecting it.
My mother looked at them curiously and lifted up first one, then another. She passed her thin hands over the table and looked some more.
“Who did these?”
“One of the elephants, the baby.”
She laid down the page she was holding and picked up the last one.
“It takes a cultured sensibility to appreciate a line,” she said critically. “The little genius appears to have a good sense of balance. If one of my students had done these I’d say there was happiness and intention in these lines.”
“They remind me of those endless Asian bamboos.”
She laughed. “Or de Kooning. . . . What does your elephant man say?”
“His name’s Jo.”
“What does he say?”
“He hasn’t seen them. I just do them with the elephants on my own.”
“And Dr.
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