Month: August 2022

There were six kittens inside me. I birthed four and we swaddled them in little baby blankets, nestled them side by side in the fruit basket. Mother said to rest on the sofa. I watched the other two kittens squirming inside me. I could feel them romping inside, sometimes pressing on my bladder. I asked Jane to sketch the shapes of them in her book. Their little cat bodies moving just under my skin. Their spines, each delicate notch, rising and falling. Their paws flexing out, then disappearing. Fast. Their bodies moving from one side of my abdomen to the other. As if they were playfully chasing each other inside my darkness.

Ribbons for my hat. Blue. Like the sky when the rough wind is up, pushing and pressing, all the leaves of the trees and things go flying. Look, there’s father going past. Hello, Father. Orange ribbons too. Like the egg yolk from a well-fed chicken. You can make a baby chick out of that. I crack the egg and there is nothing but air and a sweet friendly scent that makes me sad.

I wonder how I ever knew anything. There were doors and then more doors. I stepped from one to the next. Opening and stepping through. It was all doors. All the same door, repeating.

I make a concoction. There are only two ingredients. I mix the crushed flowers, soft, silky pink with the mint. The fluid leaks out and I pour that into a small porcelain bowl. Emma, it is time to drink this. She steps back. Mother says, Emma, This is for your own good. We laugh.

A baby crawling across the street. I consider helping it. A living thing no bigger than my thumb. Tiny and naked. Vulnerable and filthy. I could pick it up and carry it out of the road. But if I touch it, it will be mine. I keep walking.

I have the sensation of someone watching me. I turn but there is no one there. I feel guilty. A deep unease. I turn off the light and get into bed. I close my eyes and imagine Miss Bates. Dear Miss Bates. Her eyes are closed too. She is also in bed, snoring. She dreams and I dream. In the morning we wake. Her mother still sleeps. Miss Bates gets out of bed, scampers into the kitchen, pulls a book and a pen and ink out from a cupboard. I watch over her shoulder as she writes down all the images she saw while she slept. The things that were said. She is embarrassed and confused. But there is something to be known here. She puts the book, pen, and ink away. She starts the fire for the kettle. The day begins.

A neighbor man wants me to help him fix a drawer. He makes a gesture. He is catching in his large hands an object I cannot see. He has a flame between his palms but no candle to go with it. I feel a little sick in my belly. Like something tiny is flying in the emptiness. We are laughing.

I hold a book. It is much too small. A book for a doll or young child. We walk on the ruined part of the hill. So much wet thick earth and the strands of trampled vivid green grass coming through. Father is slipping, but mother is safe far ahead. Someone speaks. A voice! From all around me. It says, That is a book about the true nature of everything. This tiny book in my hands with words too tiny to read? In it is written that Satan is us. That knowledge comes from the book itself, as if the letters crawl from the page and through my skin, into my blood. I shove the book into the earth. Father laughs, says, Hetty, Satan cannot be all around you and inside you and not also be you

I have five cards. We are at a table. Mr. Woodhouse sits across the room, over by the fire, out of the chill. He has only one eye in the center of his face. I look back to my cards. I have only three. Mother. Where is mother? I get up. With each step, the room shifts. I am off the carpet and walking down the side of the walls as if this is natural. The colors are too vibrant. The furniture moans. Mother, are you down this dark corner? Mother, are you in the room with the tiny fire burning? The hallway is long and tilts and yawns. I feel it shudder and stretch as if it’s a living thing. I don’t want to be here. My legs tremble.

We are in a carriage. Mother next to me. It is dark night, yet I can see everything as if it were daylight. All is vivid and absolutely pure. The moon is behind the clouds. The crisp air. I see my breath. Miniature puffs of bright white yarn, floating from my mouth. There’s a bump in the road. We go up into the air. I look down as I fall. There is no carriage beneath me, no seat, but the horses are still prancing in front as if they are pulling us forward. I find myself sitting so politely on the air. I look up and there’s mother coming down from the night sky, her skirts all fluffed up. So gentle. Falling down, so softly. We are on the fresh backs of horses, galloping, our thighs clutching  tightly their warm bodies. I yell, “Mother, we are riding!” She doesn’t hear me. Her hair has come undone. Long strands, white as the moon, flowing behind her. It is beautiful, but improper.

Mother says, “Dear, please, may I have more tea.” I notice her mouth is not moving. We are in the sitting room. Outside it is raining. I see the mud and muck and puddles even though I am nowhere near a window. I turn and am standing in the kitchen. Mother says, “What are we going to do about the horses eating all the silk purses?” Emma says, “How delightful. So pretty,” as she pets the horse I am holding. It is quite small. It fits in my arms and nibbles and pulls at my shoulder, searching for sweet grasses in the fabric of my dress.