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Authors: Jill Ciment
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leaving them with the enormous blond hermaphrodite and his cotton-clad ghost companion. Decorously, they averted their eyes from ours: to stare was to be the aggressor.
But we stared. We’d just spotted their tattoos—a turtle with human hands, stick figures in coitus, in prayer, in battle, an ark, a cockatoo, a praying mantis, a bolt of lightning, and abstractions that looked as if ants had been dipped in ink and let loose upon the body.
The colors were indigo, cinnabar, viridian, and lampblack. No body part was exempt—not earlobes or throats or fingers or toes, not even lips.
The islanders stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the pink sand. When one of them shifted a foot, or turned his head, or twisted in any way, the effect was that of a great tapestry billowing.
I tried to catch Philip’s eye, but he was already moving toward them. He had to hoist up the wet hem of his sarong so that he could walk without tripping.
The women burst into a salvo of giggles.
Philip laughed at himself, too, a little too exuberantly. “I was told you speak English,” he said, smiling. But I could hear the tremor in his voice. Philip wasn’t frightened of these people. He was never frightened of the alien, the strange, the beautiful. No, Philip was terrified that if he didn’t succeed here, while there might be other islands, other opportunities for collecting, this particular failure would leech away his confidence, and then it wouldn’t matter where we went.
Not a soul responded.
He steeled himself and marshaled on. “Thank you for allowing us to visit your beautiful island. My name is Philip, and this is my wife Sara. We have come a very long way because your mask makers are great, great artists, and we believe the world should know this and honor you because of it. We are artists ourselves, and if you will allow us, we would be grateful to witness your master carvers at work and to offer them, and you and your chiefs, gifts in exchange for their creations. Sara, why don’t you show them our gifts.”
I opened the steamer trunk and held up a steel ax and a string of plastic pearls. I would have offered them the cotton clothes off my back if they would only trade their masks with him.
No one said anything. They didn’t even whisper among themselves.
Finally, an old woman broke ranks and stepped forward. By her regal manner, she was obviously of high rank. Her hair was teased into a voluminous cone and adorned with seashells. Her face was tattooed from ear to ear: I couldn’t quite read her expression. Threatening? Curious? Walking right up to us, she folded her arms over her large flat breasts and studied Philip, me, the ax, the gaudy necklace, our gear, then Philip again. She had to crane her neck skyward to meet his eye: she was shorter than I was. Finally, she turned her back on us and walked away, motioning the others to follow.
Some of the younger men and women wanted to come over and see what else was in our trunk, but they obeyed the old woman, dispersing into the forest. It was like watching a great tapestry being torn apart and the tatters coming to life.
The islanders had designed themselves so that the sum of their creation was always greater than its parts. An individual’s tattoos were considered by the tribe to be no more meaningful than a word taken out of context.
This is why, when viewed singularly, as I am viewed these days, my tattoos don’t seem nearly as profound as I claim them to be. To the squeamish who can’t quite bear to look at me, I’m a mere curiosity; to those who do look, really look, I must seem the most isolated of souls.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Philip started heaving our provisions away from the oncoming tide before everything got soaked and ruined, while I sat down uselessly in the sand. I’d been given hints of grandeur in the past—the New York skyline at sunset, pinwheels of luminosity cast by a chandelier—but nothing had prepared me for this. We were in the bowl of a vast
But we stared. We’d just spotted their tattoos—a turtle with human hands, stick figures in coitus, in prayer, in battle, an ark, a cockatoo, a praying mantis, a bolt of lightning, and abstractions that looked as if ants had been dipped in ink and let loose upon the body.
The colors were indigo, cinnabar, viridian, and lampblack. No body part was exempt—not earlobes or throats or fingers or toes, not even lips.
The islanders stood shoulder-to-shoulder on the pink sand. When one of them shifted a foot, or turned his head, or twisted in any way, the effect was that of a great tapestry billowing.
I tried to catch Philip’s eye, but he was already moving toward them. He had to hoist up the wet hem of his sarong so that he could walk without tripping.
The women burst into a salvo of giggles.
Philip laughed at himself, too, a little too exuberantly. “I was told you speak English,” he said, smiling. But I could hear the tremor in his voice. Philip wasn’t frightened of these people. He was never frightened of the alien, the strange, the beautiful. No, Philip was terrified that if he didn’t succeed here, while there might be other islands, other opportunities for collecting, this particular failure would leech away his confidence, and then it wouldn’t matter where we went.
Not a soul responded.
He steeled himself and marshaled on. “Thank you for allowing us to visit your beautiful island. My name is Philip, and this is my wife Sara. We have come a very long way because your mask makers are great, great artists, and we believe the world should know this and honor you because of it. We are artists ourselves, and if you will allow us, we would be grateful to witness your master carvers at work and to offer them, and you and your chiefs, gifts in exchange for their creations. Sara, why don’t you show them our gifts.”
I opened the steamer trunk and held up a steel ax and a string of plastic pearls. I would have offered them the cotton clothes off my back if they would only trade their masks with him.
No one said anything. They didn’t even whisper among themselves.
Finally, an old woman broke ranks and stepped forward. By her regal manner, she was obviously of high rank. Her hair was teased into a voluminous cone and adorned with seashells. Her face was tattooed from ear to ear: I couldn’t quite read her expression. Threatening? Curious? Walking right up to us, she folded her arms over her large flat breasts and studied Philip, me, the ax, the gaudy necklace, our gear, then Philip again. She had to crane her neck skyward to meet his eye: she was shorter than I was. Finally, she turned her back on us and walked away, motioning the others to follow.
Some of the younger men and women wanted to come over and see what else was in our trunk, but they obeyed the old woman, dispersing into the forest. It was like watching a great tapestry being torn apart and the tatters coming to life.
The islanders had designed themselves so that the sum of their creation was always greater than its parts. An individual’s tattoos were considered by the tribe to be no more meaningful than a word taken out of context.
This is why, when viewed singularly, as I am viewed these days, my tattoos don’t seem nearly as profound as I claim them to be. To the squeamish who can’t quite bear to look at me, I’m a mere curiosity; to those who do look, really look, I must seem the most isolated of souls.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Philip started heaving our provisions away from the oncoming tide before everything got soaked and ruined, while I sat down uselessly in the sand. I’d been given hints of grandeur in the past—the New York skyline at sunset, pinwheels of luminosity cast by a chandelier—but nothing had prepared me for this. We were in the bowl of a vast
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