Queen of Knives

 
Mother has been weeping for three days. Each time I go outside to
pick blackberries for supper, or even to take a dip in the pond, she looks at me as though she’s seeing me for the last time. She thinks I don’t notice – just tells me not to catch cold – but I see her wiping her eyes. I hear her at night. She always turns her back.

Mother, why are you crying?

I’m not crying my love, I have something in my eye. Allergies.
(laughs, brushing it off)

(shivering)It’s cold in here. Why is it so cold?

Autumn must be coming.

What is Autumn? 

(sighs deeply) You don’t remember, do you?

Remember what?

It is like this every time. Always like it was the first time.


The first time?

You’re going back to your husband, my love.

Husband? I don’t have…

But then something stops me, because I remember…something…someone. I remember being afraid and I remember dark kisses and promises…I remember dead people and six pomegranate seeds laid out carefully
before me. I remember a choice…

She turns around to look at me and in her eyes I can see the memories that flood back are not simply dreams but the truth.

Your duties my dear. As a queen.

Queen? But I’m just…

More memories…darkness. It’s dark there, but not without its majesty. Rooms…caverns? Tunnels, and…ghosts. Parades and parades of ghosts, and I, next to my dark paramour on my throne…

He wants me back, doesn’t he?

He always does. As I’ve said, you and I, we have our duties.
 
We…?

You have your throne.

And you?

Autumn. Go dress yourself in something warm. The messenger will
be here soon.

___

It’s only while I’m in transit that I remember everything, and the memories build. When I reach either destination, I have no memory of the other place. I get there and it’s like I’ve never left…and my memories of the other place become cloudy and disappear and my time int hat place is untainted…until I’m travelling again and everything comes flooding back, is put into context.


Every six months, I do this. Follow the messenger up, or follow the messenger down. I am a rope, a sinewy, knotted rope, growing frayed with age as millennia pass. A rope in an ancient tug-of-war between stubborn and unyielding siblings. My mother. My husband. Six months here; six months there.
Neither of them has every asked me what I prefer.

___

He’s formidable, my husband, and the air perceptibly changes as I spiral closer and closer to where he is. Each time I see him, it’s like the first time, and he takes my breath away – why anyone would ever want to be blond and hale when dark and gaunt has such a profound sway – 

My husband.

My love. (breathing)

And my life up there starts to disappear again. There’s something so intoxicating and present about being here, being with him that it makes everything up there seem like a dream as I deal with the ever-present reality of the state of things here: The truth of the matter is, the dead pester me with their attentions. As though I could do something for them.

Queen! They call me, as they prostrate themselves at my feet. Mistress!

And it all comes flooding back to me, all the many names they have called me for millennia and my little life with my mother in our cottage by the pond is laughable, trivial and so very innocent!

Mistress of the Damned! Snow Queen. Spirit of Winter. Lady Ice. I slip my mantle on and the ice, like a thousand tiny knives settles back inside me as I hold court for the legions of ghosts who are my subjects with my dark lord by my side…and the tug-of-war begins again.

***

The winter street speaks...
If you stand still enough to hear it.

The wan Seattle sun sets into
a frigid January night -
no one stays outside long.

Get off the bus, walk briskly those two blocks home.
Park the car, sprint to the door.
The dog gets a quick walk -
No lingering trip around the lake tonight.

But the winter street is out and about.
Icy lamps casting frozen diamonds in the grass
Telling tales of hidden treasure, if you listen hard enough.

Skeletal trees make brittle arches towards the sidewalk
And cars, like silent sentinels growing a moss of frost.
The winter street offers secrets
Inviting any who catch its whispers
To step into this quiet mystery of freezing dark.