Jeffery Allen - Song of the Shank

There in her quarters the world dropped away. Morning light so heavy that it almost shattered the stained glass windows as it fell into the room, so heavy that it hurt when it dropped onto her — bearing up in that light, bearing that light — every familiar object in the room (table, chair, bed, closet, lamp, bowl, basin) atremble (quivering), fragile, brittle in the face of such breakage. Like the clouds the walls changed color. She tried to keep very still in the fantastic temperatures of the room and make her way to the fires in her mind where Thomas might be, a place she could never hold for long, light distracting her, as she should be distracted, the sound (hearing) of light searing her flesh. (Light has many names.) Would lean out the window as far as she could, looking down into the ocean’s hush and hurry. And so time would wear on, each frame of the day free and clear in the unclenched light down to the dhows (mechanisms of wind) with their jagged sails, coming and going each hour, their giant hooks — gaffs they were called — coils of fishing line, and baskets visible even from her window. She would take her supper and settle into bed, until the moon appeared (at last) in the night sky, her shutters open and window swallowing a mouthful of stars.

Rooted thus in her quarters, each day passed pretty much the same her first week on the island of Edgemere. The orphans would arrive in triplicate to bring her breakfast, her dinner, and her supper — eventually, she and they came to acknowledge one another without astonishment — and, supper done, she would have to get out of bed to receive a new visitor each evening. On the third supper-curtained day, a giant stooped under the lintel and lengthened his body into the room — the wonder of it, all her life happened long before this — then stood there in all of his tall broad majesty in his billowing robe, a wild mangle of folds. The curious circumstances of his height, which elicited feelings of attraction and repulsion, protection and terror, placed him beyond the physical confines of handsome and ugly. (His face hardly registered.) He introduced himself as Reverend Wire. Even his voice made a powerful impression on her. Sometimes God chooses not to explain. Sister Wiggins, if you need answers I would encourage you to sojourn to that place where only the Holy Ghost can take us through prayers. Whenever he delivered his weekly sermon to the seated assemblage in the chapel, it was the word of the Almighty writing Himself on her flesh. Many of us believe that God gives us too little. Oh, how wrong we are. Let me tell you, my children, that when God gives He gives in excess. Make no mistake about that. It is for each of us to take full advantage of His plentiful quantities. The five senses exist for more than five reasons. He who listens too hard does not see. And he who looks too hard does not hear. To all appearances he was completely at ease sermonizing from his lofty position at the pulpit, his long arms fully extended beneath him on either side of the podium to support his long body, which jutted all the way forward over the podium at a precarious angle as if he were about to make an acrobatic effort to jacknife his lower extremities into the air and stand (balance) on his hands.

Each Sunday the orphans make a spirited march into the chapel as one organized body, more than two hundred of them — how many lives can go on at once? — only to break into playful frenzy: bodies planted between the furrows of pews, hiding-and-seeking, hands scooping up coins of sunlight scattered across the floor, lips drumming rhymed banter — the Dozens they called it — all of their endeavors bright and hopeful. Talking, playing, laughing, until they realize that she is there in the chapel with them and they surge forward — the aspect of delight insists upon a closer look — welcoming her with daisied smiles. They want to hold, to be held. Perhaps she gives one or two of them a hug. The watching faces swoop down from the wall in a swarm of armed appearances so that the service can begin. We give thanks for the young ones among us, who remind us how much we need to do to create with them a better world. We should not indict our children with our deeds and ambitions. So what must we say? The orphans all hold her hand — what else means anything to them? — or the dense folds of her pleats. While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal. There’s a fullness here, some surplus, that she won’t respond to. (Is that it?) She can only empty herself with prayer. I was reading the Book of Corinthians the other day and I came across this strange verse. Let me read it to you: 1 Corinthians 12:17 says, “If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be?” The rest of the verse is also strange: “If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be?” She takes a good hard look at the children, her hesitations blurred. Each Sunday she brings herself to the chapel, but she knows she is not enough. For all of their dawdling, their moping and whining, their store of groans and paroxysms of wails and howls that accompany the sorrow of her leaving the chapel after Sunday service, Reverend Wire is reluctant to take the whip or rod to their backsides. They give reason for cruelty, but he has opted for accommodation. (Quiet feelings come to suffice.) God makes us good, but it is our duty and responsibility as Africans and as Christians to be better. Think about it. Turn it over in your heart.

The fourth day, a figured shaft of air spiraled in the doorway, Deacon Double bringing the scent of earth and flowers. Awkwardly smiling, awkwardly received. He inclined his posture toward her — this impulse to lean forward, to lean across — nodded, and took her hand but took it too hard. A quaver, a fumbling, a missed beat, a smile held too long. His head rested egg-like softly on his shoulders, and his narrow eyes and broad forehead reminded her of a statue with its fixed sculpted eyes, an ancient granite face (his skin gray). He moved buoyantly around the candlelit room but with almost hoofed (goat, horse, deer) precision, stepping slowly and carefully as if on dangerous terrain. While circulating he looked around with curious insistence, intoning words as if he were singing in the voice of someone twice his size. Sister , he said, be patient, and keep your head high, for the one you are waiting for will soon be here. I believe that the time is at hand when the sons of God shall be revealed —stopping every now and again for a lingering look, that sconce on the wall, those porcelain knobs on the cupboard doors, the ill-fitting drawers, his skin changing color depending on where he stood in the room, now yellow like the bedsheets, now red like the clay pitcher, as she had heard that certain magical lizards could do in Africa. I saw a door standing open in heaven, and the same voice I had heard before spoke to me with the sun of a mighty trumpet blast. The voice said, Come up here, and I will show you what must happen after these things. So I went up and I saw. She tries to understand the riot of his words — I marvel at the sun which is not afraid to repeat itself and at the seasons that come again and again, or the bee returning to the flower, and at new things repeating the old —for he has a thousand proverbs and verses to hand, one for every occasion. Those are hurt who want to be hurt. Agony does not only belong to the heart. And thus do the innocent suffer. Not because God is punishing them but because they have very little power to stop what is causing their suffering. But power with others can change the world. The spirit bears the body forward. C harity pleased to learn something new and useful, although she said nothing to him about her gratification. Each glass-globed and sconced flame burning on the wall bent toward him as he passed. (He bent the light toward him.)