Sarah Bynum - Madeleine Is Sleeping

marguerite, upon the desertion of so many of her entertainers, has fallen back on her own devices. Every night, after all, there is still the widow leaning forward in her chair, expecting pleasure. What is Marguerite to do but unlock her monstrous trunk, exhaling clouds of musk, and shake out her ancient costumes? The general’s uniform, the lover’s red cape, the burnished breastplate worn by a vengeful son. She also digs up, from the very bottom, her sword, which she slices through the air with untrammeled delight. Of course, she must remember how to walk. How to swing her arms, and beat her chest, and meet a comrade heartily. That is easy enough to master. More tedious is wrestling her bosom back into its old restraints, tugging on the powdered wigs; the effort is proven worthwhile, however, upon her discovery that thus disguised, she has managed to enchant the resdess widow. She finds an amorous note slipped beneath her door. She finds herself the object of winks, and eloquent glances. In the mornings, when she steps out from her caravan, she is greeted by an avalanche of roses. Who is Marguerite, not to welcome love when it arrives at last? Wearing her red cape and brandishing her sword, she courts the widow; she wins her hand; she takes up residence in the very grand house, and learns that if one concentrates, growing a William II moustache is not so difficult to do.

A fishing village sits at the edge of a warm sea. The moon beats her path across the waves, across the little boats rocking in their moors, past the shuttered shops and dark cafes, up a flight of whitewashed stairs, and through the open window of a rented apartment. Alighting upon an empty basket beneath the sill, and then a botde, also empty, the moon comes tumbling into the room. She illuminates a chair, over which is draped an elegant tailcoat, a white butterfly tie, a pair of black satin breeches. She uncovers a wagon, inside of which is gathered a small family of flutes. And gliding up to the rumpled expanse of the bed, she finds what she has been searching for: a head resting on another’s chest, his pale face loosened in sleep. He breathes deeply. He does not moan. His head rises and falls with the other’s inhalations, and the movement is as gentle, as infinite, as that of a fishing boat lulled by the sea. Shyly the moon extends her white fingers. She caresses the two men dreaming in the bed. Her hands are so light, and so full of care, that when they awake, they will not even know that they have been touched.

stirring MADELEINE stirs in her sleep.

the barn is silent. All eyes are fixed upon the sleeping girl, She lies there, indifferent to their gaze: inert, dreaming, blank, detached. Innocence, some might take it for, the audience seeing her as if for the first time, as if she has been restored, through sleep, to her proper dimensions; she is only a girl, asleep, her hands folded neady on her chest. She looks small. Her monstrous hands look small as well. The people of her town cannot stop gazing at them, at how quietly they lie. They watch her hands with the absorption I of a poet, who cannot bear to look away from his mark on the page, the word he has left there.

from behind the curtain comes a fluttering, and Mme. Cochon steps out onto the stage. Her hair is dishevelled, her wings are askew, but it is with a beautiful degree of poise that she extracts her diary from deep between her breasts. When she opens the book, its pages fan out like a peacocks tail. The audience sighs at this disturbance, as if she were a noisy member in their midst. But she will not be silenced. She says to them: You know me as a woman of science. For months you have seen me at work on this volume, in which I’ve recorded many small and mysterious signs. Now, at last, I wish to share with you my findings. Holding her book in one hand, gathering up her fat in the other, Mme. Cochon sweeps past the half-wit, and like a dainty lady forced to navigate a puddle, she frowns at the girl lying asleep on the stage, and finally steps over her, as though she were of little matter. From the first page of her book, the woman reads: Hush. And together, the neighbors, the brothers and sisters, together they inhale softly and the barn fills with one endless exhalation of breath: Shhhhhhhhhhhhh. It is all about to begin.