I Left My Wings on a Chair

The Viking and the Field Mouse

2 t h e V I K I n g a n D t h e f I e L D m o U s e It’s getting too crowded in here with the woman looking down from above saying something about a metamorphosis and the brown shell cracking, the raging father, the grandmother with her pursed lips, the Viking and the field mouse, the lost children. It reminds you of a play when the stage is full and everyone’s singing at once and you know you won’t know what’s going on until the end. maybe in the costume room there’s a wig and some red lipstick, but your house feels all wrong anyway with its wall-to-wall carpet, and what you really want is that old, drafty house with the fireplace, jazz ringing off the bare floors, one easy chair and reading light next to the fire and the skinniest chicken in the oven. someone gives you a kitten. no. you are decidedly alone, and the kitten finds you. It wandered around for weeks in the country. no. you find the kitten, all hungry from city living, and you blow on little pieces of skin and fat from the scrawny chicken and think maybe you need some birds and a fig tree. ...