Among the Goddesses

Marie Moving, Book 7: Kali

73 Book 7: Kali On the shaking and rattling bus feeling nauseous, I looked for courage. The other heart had begun its beating in the rich cave, the long silence, the hoping morning that had been my womb. Through my belly ran knife-hard images to my body and to my heart. For the first time, the pregnancy hurt me. I knew its life could betray mine soon. The hate that had touched me on the mountain was still thriving, making a silence deep in me still, a yielding mine, where my own thoughts could not find a foothold but plummeted, hopeless, down in my body, absorbed by its power. I stayed quiet. Houses started to thin out around me. Night filled the horizon’s undulations, branching out in darkening trees. Kouretes: She stands up slowly. She puts the tapestry down on the table. Then the bus stopped. Leaves brushed at the windows. Rain was coming. I knew through the thick sky the smell of water, along with dusk. We were approaching the Serpent Mound, where an ancient hill made a long grassy snake coiling hard in the wilding night. Rain pulled at me with the air of a distance as the driver opened the door. Soon I would get out and look for Kali. 74 With a rattle of strap and backpack, missing Brigid, I moved to the door and looked out while we rocked to a stop. The dark highway led me from the others, and then a narrow path led to Kali. Mist soaked my skin, and the night finally entered. Past the place where the edge of the Mound was spiralling, I moved, through untrimmed branches wet with rain, to her muddy driveway. Kouretes: She stands up slowly. She puts the tapestry down on the table. We see in its folds a glimpse of creation, animals, planets, mountains, and trees, embroidered thick with contrasts and colors, on a background as warm as blood. The door opens. Kali appears there, looks around blankly, and shuts the door. I walked cautiously, knowing my belly full of wide wings, night, and starlight. Her small light shone like a flame through one window where I could see her, sitting, sewing on a huge tapestry. I knocked and waited in the rain, as she stood up slowly and carefully put it down on the table. I saw in its folds a glimpse of creation, animals, planets, mountains, and trees, embroidered thick with contrasts and colors, on a background as warm as blood. After a moment of silence, Lily runs forward angrily and pounds on the door. 75 Lily (pounding): Kali! Kali! Come back out here! Let me in! Kali! Kali! Kali, who is very small, opens the door again and stands there staring at Lily. Lily moves to stand beside her in the doorway. Kali suddenly brushes past her resentfully. Lily follows her in. Then she opened the door. I was nervous, and drew back a moment, speechless, waiting for her to see me. What would she do? Nothing. All she did was stand there one long minute, with hollow eyes in a chiselled face, blind to my body, look unfocussed, and shut the door. Gouged and shocked, with those two sharp impressions shadowing my eyes, where her smudged, sightless vision had absorbed me, undone me, and left me as wet as invisible, outside the door, I half-panicked. I thought of leaving, but then ran forward in desperate anger and pounded again on the glistening wood, shouting, calling, cursing and threatening her till she finally answered, and focused, and stared. She stared up and down and stared right through me, half-attentive and clearly resentful, while I stood on the doorstep. And then, when I had followed her purposefully in and stood beside her, towering past her, I saw that her tiny face was resigned, ready to help me. She grew taller, it seemed, and harder, and I was confused and drew far back so she could walk by. 76 Scene 3. Inside Kali’s house. The huge tapestry rests on a table at stage left. There is a wall in the center of the stage with a cupboard, painted red with a purple border, and a door leading to another, smaller room which is in darkness so complete it is nearly impossible to see it. Kali goes to a cupboard and takes out a tall jar filled...