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Cantata for a Riderless Horse
- Northwestern University Press
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35 Cantata for a Riderless Horse I a child sees a man on a flying trapeze, Face swathed in pink tulle, bomb tucked to his belly. Behind him, a car squares off in air, Wheels lambent, turning. In the bleakness of space, everything is still. The bomb lands in a pile of straw dragged from the stables. The circus tent glows, The fire is insuperable, seemingly without cause, The bomb a misshapen egg hurts no one, The tent in flames Is a nothing but a rag and bone shop, Sty of memory. II We like to think of the inner life as the cause of things. One might as well say that the happiness Of Sanskrit is the cause of speech as novalis did when he was very young. Was he watching death round the corner, 36 Past the broken barn on the mountainside With the tangle of blue flowers no one else noticed? death in the shape of an old horse Tied to a laurel tree, acid in its nostrils, still snorting. The stables I saw in my dreams (Source of the straw that cradled the bomb) are filled with anxious horses. III In the ashwamedha rite, a white horse let loose roams through territory war must claim. The horse is sacrificed and a great queen, I think of draupadi here, lies down beside the smoking parts. In Pune, when I was a child We lived on Ganeshkind road. In the wedding season I saw a pale horse bearing a bridegroom, His face veiled in flowers. I willed her to sit beside him Clutching the horse’s flanks, a bride, sari storm red, Slashed with gold. [54.167.52.238] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 22:19 GMT) 37 On the garden line, on the white sheet amma hung In midsummer before the rains came, male and female turned to shadows, mixing with the horse’s flesh. IV I had no chiseled gold to bring, You had no horse, no drums. all we had was a dusty town, a mountaintop, Wild flowers, ceaseless mist. I married you in the midst of what I felt Was a war in my own life. But who the parties were I could not say, even if forced to the edge of a cliff. The war continued, But now you were a party to it. In the midst of this we had our children. With what lay to hand— a scrap of paper, a ream of string We made a shelter of straw With a wishbone in it. The bleached bone snapped. The young ones turned Into precious hostages. 38 We bought a house in the woods, a stalwart thing of wood and brick: When dinner plates chipped, Or a squirrel dropped down the chimney a black walnut clutched in its claws, When deer ravaged the blue spruce Or bullfinches sucked up earthworms at the edge of a pond Where our children swam mud splayed on their thighs, I glimpsed the desolation Of earthly paradise. V reared on betrayal I could not bear to be happy. I flinched at truth Buried in muscle and skin, Intricate loops of blood— mute harrowing. Survival of the fittest parts of the self I thought was what was called for. like a woman who wears a wig To conceal stubble on the skull, [54.167.52.238] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 22:19 GMT) 39 I coveted the split ends Of desire. Hurt poured into our hands. When I touched her, I flinched— a child clinging to a horse, Pink suit shimmering with sweat, eyes clammed tight Willing the man on the flying trapeze to drop, Willing the bomb to splinter his ribs Into fractions of glass, The tent etched in rainbow colors, Smeared with ash. VI There is something desolate in us That tries to lay love waste. But love too has its daring, Its unbegotten species of sense making. I come to you now, dirt in my hair From a country road Where we saw a white horse rear its hooves. a helicopter rattled by. 40 Was it spraying crops? Who could tell? Shall we sing to her, the child hidden in a cloud? Who knows if we can wake her. Coda Yesterday, I folded up our clothes. It seemed to me they smelt of wild grass From the edge of the mountain where we lay, rocks streaked indigo, accidental hue of a scarf you bought me a century ago On a street where men...