Читать книгу Painted Oxen - Thomas Lloyd Qualls - Страница 10

You are at a yard sale. Tables are set up on a sprawling, lush green that covers an entire hillside. Not the typical fold-up, garage sale variety tables, but substantial pieces of furniture, antiques. Some more ornate than others, each covered with some type of cloth, from tattered linen to rich velvet. Candles, feathers and books are arranged on every surface. Along with all manner of stones and jewels. Each table is surrounded by buyers and sellers, bartering. Scattered among the tables are makeshift living rooms. Handwoven rugs from India and Afghanistan, rolled out on the grass, set the frame for each open room. Each space is anchored by colorful high-back chairs, couches, and settees arranged in clusters. People of all size and skin color sit together in these outdoor rooms, chatting enthusiastically, smoking from hookahs, drinking tea. You wander curiously through this mélange and then across the grass to the edge of the green where there is a steep cliff, overlooking a meandering river. The edge of the river is littered with broken bits of terra cotta, a living history of countless cups of chai.

You turn back to the gathering on the green and in a blink you are sitting in a dark purple chair, speaking to an old woman in pale blue robes, who hands you a cup of tea and asks you if you can see. Of course I can see, you think. But before you can answer out loud, she leans towards you and points her index finger to the middle of your forehead, then touches the spot lightly. The instant she does, a hole in your forehead opens up and the solid surface that was your skin ripples around her finger like water. At the same time, you see thousands of people in white robes standing about on an invisible plane, which stretches out beyond the horizon. One of them, a beautiful woman with sparkling green eyes and brilliant red hair, stands in front of you and bends down to speak. Like what you see? She says. And before you can answer, the old woman removes her finger and you are back in the outdoor living room.

Unceremoniously, the old woman asks what you have to trade. You look at your empty hands and think for a second. This, you say, as a deck of cards materializes in your right hand and you send an arc of cards through the air and into your open left hand, bridging the space between.

Card tricks, she huffs, and waves you off.

You shrug, finish your tea and excuse yourself. She doesn’t understand, you say to yourself. Sight is not the same thing as vision.

Without bridges, there are no connections. Without bridges, there are only chasms. Without bridges, there are only longings. We cannot wait for the land to flatten and the stream to narrow before we seek to cross.