CZ Studio and Radio Verte presents The Wild Wind by Corey Zimmerman.
Chapter 2
Reality. The sound of a pill bottle no longer rattling. A dead snake. The sound of teeth grinding as I scoured every drawer and cabinet to no avail. The sound of scraping on the inside of the skull, nails dug deep into the bone.
Reality. The sound of shattered mirrors and bloody knuckles. The sound of a pounding chest, dizziness and fear. The sound of ribs cracking with gut-wrenching heaves into a bucket. Squeaky springs. A mattress long soaked in haunted delirium. Metallic snakes slithering through the mind like razor blades. The mortal coil sprung from under the dry and cracked lifeless desert.
The flesh skidding tongue of a mountainous cat. Sheets of ice upon the turbulent river in late winter. Snow-burnt eyes upon the tundra. Ears whistling like steam engines in an empty hollow. The tattered roof of an old farmhouse.
Thin flesh tearing like tissue paper. Red, inflamed heat. Rashes unable to bear the slightest touch of the soft cotton sheet. Shed like the skin of a snake. Coiled up inside, I found only a battleground. A trench of stench and filth and misery. As all the songbirds knew longer go to flee. Lost. Not in control.
Disconnected from the existential umbilical cord. Anchored to time and space. I desperately grasped onto my body. Flesh I wanted more. To claw out from within. From midnight to dawn. Rodents and bats preyed upon my weakest hours. And they prayed for a merciful death and welcomed the shadow in the corner of my eye.
But when I asked who she was, she said, nobody. And when I asked what she wanted, she answered, nothing. She left in silence. But the others, the countless and cursing others, they came out of the walls. Piercing my eardrums with their sharp tongues. Circling like buzzards. A rub spit in my eyes.
But they held onto my big toe. Might I sleep this sleep of death? Yet my pinky finger woke me, time and time again. To the cawing of the circling rain crows just above my slouching roof. Breathing the breath of death upon my goose pimpled neck. I promised not to spat in their eye. But death failed to arrive in its darkest cloak. To shroud my eyes in eternal darkness. And my heart continued to beat.
The old house shook after midnight. And the chairs spun and rocked. Fists knocking from within the walls. And I was starving. And I managed to mutter, bread and butter come to supper. Bread and butter come to supper.
With my legs crossed. Cheekbones protruding. Hair and yellowed nails growing like the dead. Scissors clenched in my claw. I thought to stab myself in the neck. But I rubbed an egg on my throat and found the strength to stand and wobble. Only to get lost in my own house. Staring at walls for endless hours. Looking for a door in a room with no door.
My mind, a rabid beast, feening for a way back to that place that rattled. That snake pit. That bottle of bones. A bottle I could crawl back inside of. And perish in the warmth of my dreams.
Wicked nightmares. Old Scratch himself appearing with his cold black eyes and split tongue.
I begged of the darkness. Offering promises and deals. Drawing a cross of soot upon my heart to appease him. Him with no soul. With a soul of my own. He swallowed me whole only to vomit me back up into the bucket. But I overflowed its edges and seeped deep between the boards of the floor.
When I awoke the next morning with a gasp. My heart was weak. But I rubbed my eyes and looked around my empty room for empty eye sockets. Dolls pulled out by their hair. Scarred across the face by fire. Bent over men with no spines.
In bloody vaginas screaming in terror. Abandoned. Lost and hurt. Clenching and grasping on deform in time. I survived.
In a fine pair of shoes. Crossing the endless plain in the merciless winter. As a strong gale howled something fierce across the hilltop. The creaking of the frozen thicket in my bones. I survived.
In time the shakes went away. My vision cleared and my eyes stopped ringing. And one day I walked into mama's room where she used to weep her nights away. And I sat down in her rocking chair. And right there before me on her nightstand in the light of day.
Sat a plastic bottle. When I shook it rattled away. My stomach turned and I ran to the toilet. I survived.
I made a pork roast and yanked out the dream bone. But I found no jam as I went to the pantry for bread. It had rained on the 2nd of June and I knew the blackberry bushes must be full. So I popped three yellow ones. Oval. Along with a small piece of salted pork to prevent seasickness.
And I set forth with a buckeye strung around my neck and pa's hunting knife in hand. All the while being careful not to hit my right leg on the corner of the table. I blessed my house so it should not burn down in my absence.
I stood upon the porch until the tide went out. And when the time came I climbed into the boat and sailed gently forth across the sea of dirt. The wild wind filled the sails. And I could see the thicket on the horizon. My thought of pa's. How he once sailed the sea. Crouching the crop down to whisper a word of encouragement in its ear. Grow.
The yellow ones flowed through my veins. And I agreed to honor his request. With winged heels to the shores of the thicket where the mortals no longer thought dividedly. Where vultures circled above. Disembarking the ship into the dense, dark thicket. I immediately came across the dead raccoon covered in flies.
Achilles, a messenger I shall be for thee. I spoke reassuringly as I stood amongst the stench of death. And I continued on until I came upon a place where the air was hot and the hair stood upon the back of my neck.
I pondered the hardships that must await as a dizzy spell overcame me. And sitting amongst the growth, delirium drifted over me.
I awoke some time later to a woodpecker. And as I stood erect upon my tiny feet, the towering tree stood high above me and counseled, barking. Woe be on to thee who thrashes the thicket without the purest of intentions. I am but a messenger, I said.
The council bent in and whispered, and a blackbird startled me. With wailing arms I shouted away, chasing the echo of the woodpecker running smack dab into a beehive.
I outran them through the thicket where no flowers grew. Where the sun did not reach the floor. Dense, dark earth groaning beneath my tiny feet.
But a prickly bush entangled my flowery dress. The trees looking down upon me, nodding and barking at my misfortune. Suggesting I return home. Denying their counsel, I tore my dress free, leaving my breast bare and my thighs bloody.
Achilles had entrusted me, for I was his messenger. And although many spears were aimed my way, I rushed forth and found them rotting and crumbling. This angered the council. Yet the mission I came to accomplish remained unaccomplished.
Thus I ignored the arrogant barking. I smeared blood over my flesh, and as a great wave of wild wind opened a path through the thicket, a rabbit scurried about, and I made forth my way.
The earth beneath the roots upon which carried my feet lent a tricky course, my toes and my heart beating so. I thanked the wild wind for assisting me upon my voyage and decided to run full gait. Nails and spines, leaving me but a scrap of dress.
The council quickly reconvened with a roar, brushing a wall of leaves before me, wrangling me like a wild horse amongst devious laughter. I shouted set me free, for I am a messenger of Achilles, the greatest warrior the earth has ever known.
One heel pierced by a thorn, blood oozed, and the earth drank. My breasts bare, hair scattered about. I stomped one hoof and neighed. I am a messenger of Achilles, I tell you. Now set me free. Set me upon my way.
Yet the council had aligned against me, stubborn in their minds, barking, What is it thou, in mere mortal desires, from the thicket? Achilles has sent me with a message, I say, and you must honor me to deliver the said message.
I shouted again. How do we know the words of which you speak are not as tarnished as your heels? The heels of your feet, the council asked. You wish to take the gamble of dishonoring Achilles, I asked in return. After a brief deliberation, the council spoke. Journey on, mortal.
Though the thicket is no place for an old crone such as yourself, we shall lend no branch, and it must be known. You may never see your home again. You are on your own.
But I warned them in return. Surely there is not much hatred in the heart of Achilles, and although he is in this moment forbearing, I am certain you thrash upon me once more, shell of insulted Achilles for the last time.
The council bowed, saying, If you truly are a messenger of Achilles, there is not another mortal as honorable as thou to grace the thicket. May ye be on your way, and ye shall not be thrashed upon again. Go in peace now, deliver the said message, and seize your reward, and return home, gloriously.
I bowed and carried forth, promising, Achilles will not forget your grace, immortal ones.
Carrying forth, I came upon the most beautiful oak tree, around which flowed a stream of Olympian water, from where a black serpent, spotted on the back, appeared from below the surface, and disappeared beneath the roots of the oak, slithering upon the trunk of a tree for a young sparrow on the topmost branch, singing in hunger.
I spotted seven in number, in the nest above, the mother swooping down to deliver dinner, the youngest ones desperately devouring the worm she provided, as she fluttered about. To her horror, the serpent seized one by its wing as it cried out, astonished at what happened, I cried out to the immortal ones.
Why do you remain silent as this serpent has devoured this young sparrow? There were eight, including the mother who simply brought food for her young, now only seven in total. Why must you stand tall with pride, yet let war wage amongst the thicket?
The council responded, A serpent eats but once a month, my dear. Shall we starve them of but a single sparrow, who daily eats a worm? While for the mother, six shall remain.
I sighed with sorrow as I laid eyes upon a deer skull in the growth. I lifted it carefully and held it in my hands, realizing a skull is nothing more than a thing, an object, unanimated, never to float through space nor time, upon a pair of shoulders again.
A skull simply lies upon the ground or sits on the bookshelf of a scholar, never to move without the hand of York. Death is but a transformation from a head into a thing, a possession, a bookend, a stage prop.
Yet only if one's skull is fortunate enough to surface from a shallow grave due to wind and rain, or an earthquake in some thousand years, left to bleach in the sun, inhaled by the gentle hands of an archaeologist, pondered by the mind of a scholar on the meaning of death, adorned by a poet in search of the words of mortality, or sniffed out and gnawed upon by the slobbery jaws of a mangy coyote.
I set the skull down upon a rock at the base of the oak and enthroned it with a shrine of small stones, when the serpent slithered out of its empty eye socket, his split tongue craving a woman's thigh. A snake killed as the enemy conquered, I said aloud, as I lifted my foot, knife in hand.
With a hiss, it turned and scurried its hairless tail away. I continued on, following the echo of the woodpecker toward the rays of sunlight, piercing the foliage like a quiver of arrows. As I reached the opening, I grasped at a dandelion growing tall in the grass. I blew on the seed ball and followed the seeds, and they led me to a bush full of ripe blackberries.
Bowing, I said, I have been sent by Achilles. I shall relay a message in exchange for a small batch of your berries. The bush bowed in return, and I leaned in close and whispered the message, and the bush bowed once more.
I quickly but gently plucked the berries and filled my scrap of dress. I think the bush and made my way back through the thicket without incident, past the immortal ones, who no longer thought to vitally, without a bark, nor a whisper of gathering leaves.
And silence rang in my ears as the echo of the woodpecker grew faint. I stepped out of the thicket upon the shore, where my sails flapped in the breeze.
Triumph. Victory no longer impending. Back in the kitchen of the farmhouse, bare-chested and bloody, I crushed the blackberries in a pot with my hands.
Above a crackling fire, I worried not, adding half a bag of sugar and stirring the mixture with a spoon made of the bones of those who stood tall. Impatient and drooling, not waiting for the jam to cool, I spread it on a slice of bread with Paw's knife and seized the prize of the thicket with my teeth.
Dropping to my knees, I slid my purple palms forth in full prostration. Chest bare, nipples chilled and hardened, my heart beating into the wooden floor.
With teeth full of seeds, I threw my head back spine-arched and spoke to the great Achilles. You give me peace in a lifetime of war.
In what of his message you ask, a message is for whom a message is heard.