Kwe: Standing With Our Sisters

  and harbours, so there

  is no evidence of human life.

  Only one map at the Nadesen Centre

  that marks the discovered mass graves

  and illegal burials.

  OPERA

  ~ Michael Ondaatje ~

  There were seven of us on the lawn, about three hours south of Colombo. It was ten o’clock at night and we were tired and we were listening to opera, a recording by one of the guests who was sitting among us. A beautiful voice accompanied by piano, recorded in Holland. Still, it was getting late, and as the fifth aria began someone started winding his watch. It went on and on. It did not stop. Everyone stilled, embarrassed, especially the opera singer, whose voice we were now listening to, her face a stone profile in the dark. I looked at each one of us sitting there on the lawn. I thought it might be Geoffrey. It was late for him and he liked to keep to his early schedules. The opera singer got up, walked past the speaker that had been brought out onto the grass, entered the house and turned the machine off before the aria had ended. She came back and sat down in silence, a slight ironic shrug towards her husband. The villain continued to wind his watch. Gradually everyone there looked at their watches, exposing their left arm by itself on a knee, or standing up to pour themselves another drink, making it clear they were not the guilty party. Until it became quite clear to all that the creaking noise was an insect in the grass, imitating a time-piece. It continued without pause even after every one had said goodnight.

  I thought, tomorrow morning there will be a bird picking up the notes of music on the lawn.

  WITNESS

  ~ Sherman Alexie ~

  I met this Native American girl at Riverfront Park in Spokane. She was tall, like volleyball spiker tall, and her incredible black unbraided hair was probably six feet long—just a little bit shorter than her. She looked to be my age, fourteen or fifteen, and as she walked, her hair floated around like she was swimming underwater.

  It was a free summer outdoor concert with some boring violin trio. It was crowded. I am uncomfortable in crowds. I’d been about to ditch my friends and go see a movie—preferably one that didn’t include violin trios on the soundtrack—when that Native American girl arrived with her friends and sat on a blanket about three feet away from me. I glanced at her but I didn’t stare like a creep. I didn’t want to bother her. I know that girls and women often get bothered by strange males. I didn’t want to be a strange male. And I really didn’t want to be a white boy obsessing on a brown girl. There are rules in life and I think it’s okay to look at attractive people, but there’s a time limit of about two seconds, you know? You look, look, and then you don’t look again. I wanted to respect that Native girl’s privacy. And, in any case, I was really beginning to hate those violinists. I wanted silence more than I wanted the company of anybody, even a beautiful girl.

  “Hey,” I said to my friends. “I gotta get out of here. I’ll see you later.”

  I like to go to movies alone. I like to eat at restaurants alone, too. I like being alone, period. Maybe that’s weird for a teenager but my friends understood why I wanted to leave. They knew I’d find them later.

  But then the Native American girl looked at me and smiled. Her teeth were toothpaste commercial perfect. I had no plans to talk to her. She was way out of my league. I was just happy that she acknowledged my presence in the world. And even though I had those rules against staring, I found myself studying her. And she studied me right back.

  And then she leaned toward me. I couldn’t believe it. I’d never gotten much attention from female strangers. I did okay with girls I already knew. I’m a pleasant-looking dude, I guess, and I’m book-smart, but I lack confidence.

  Still, despite my fear, this beautiful stranger was leaning closer and closer toward me.

  And then she reached her hand out toward my face. I thought about running away. It was too much … everything.

  I tried to talk, to say something, to grunt like a caveman, but I sat there afraid of her. Then she gently touched my hair.

  Oh, God.

  I wondered if it was really happening or if I was having one of my sex dreams. I’d been having a lot of those lately so, you know, maybe I was just having the best one of all time. Then she ran her fingers through my hair. I breathed deeply, suddenly knowing all of it was real. She leaned toward me and I thought she was going to kiss me.

  But she pulled her hand back and smiled at the small spider crawling across her fingertips.

  “It was in your hair,” she said. “I didn’t want you to get scared and smash it.”

  I was so flabbergasted that I have to use an old-fashioned word like flabbergasted to describe my emotions.

  “I wouldn’t have killed it,” I said, though I knew I was lying.

  “Yeah, right,” she said and smiled, because she knew I was lying.

  She stood, walked over to a nearby hedge, and released the spider into the shadows. It was like watching ballet. Spider-saving ballet.

  She walked back, pulled her hair into a thick rope around her head, and sat back down on her blanket.

  “In some tribes, spiders are sacred grandmothers,” she said. “They’re storytellers. Their webs tell stories, sing songs, that kind of thing.”

  “What about your tribe?” I asked. “What about you?”

  “I’m not much into religious stuff,” she said. “I just don’t like killing things.”

  She turned back to her friends. She wasn’t ignoring me. There just wasn’t a need to talk anymore. But I wanted her to keep talking. I wanted to listen. And I could have tried to make it happen. I could have tried to turn that brief magical moment into something bigger. But I realized that my relationship with her, all three minutes of it, was supposed to begin and end that quickly. Maybe that kind of magic happens to other people. Maybe it happened all the time for that Native girl. But that was the only time it had happened for me. I didn’t want to ruin it by trying to make it last longer. So, without saying goodbye to her, I stood and left the park.

  As I walked, I thought about that Native girl. And I thought about spiders. There is so much beauty in the world and I had no desire to own any of it. I just wanted to witness magic every once in a while—to briefly hold it with my gaze—and then leave it alone.

  EPIPHANY

  ~ Andrew Davidson ~

  To celebrate our first night, she came

  With flowers and the skull of a cow.

  I fear this may be: the only woman for me.

  FROM PEARL AND THE STORYTELLERS’ ACADEMY

  A NOVEL IN PROGRESS

  ~ Marilyn Bowering ~

  The night is as fantastic as a fairy tale, with stars on fire and the northern lights shaking green curtains above the mountains. He paddles smoothly—easy to keep direction by listening to the thickness of the shoreline and the way his whistles are buffered by vegetation and yet fly along the water ahead of him and into the second lake. Near the forestry cabin, wolves emerge from the trees to scout the footprints of moose and their calves trodden into shore mud. Within a day’s walk, hot springs melt caves in glaciers. In some tales, these house creatures from before the ice age; in others, warriors wait to be called upon in time of need. “Hello?” Cliff calls. “Anyone listening?”

  The longing of the heart is ancient, and it waits and swishes its tail or brandishes a spear at the right signal. Tamira had said, in the Yale town restaurant, paging through the menu after they’d decided to go their separate ways, “You’re great at what you do, Cliff, really great.” She’d paused, tapped a finger against her lips and said, “What do you think? Maybe the duck confit? What are you having?”

  None of it. He won’t have any of it.

  He’s halfway across the lake: light oozes into the sky and the mountains rise up like walls. There’s a decision to make. This time around he can’t have an accident, mistake the route, show up at the wrong time and place: one branch of the Niamue passes the mine, the other works its way westwards befor
e it enters the Stemeltlanga. Which should he take?

  He has always been coming towards her; and she towards him—just as soon as they are finished with whatever it is they think they have to do. The tagged fish have left and caught up to her, but he doesn’t know it. They wait, quietly stirring, for her to re-enter the water while he carries more than survival supplies in the canoe with him. Oil-skin wrapped dynamite; fuses and blasting caps, just in case.

  Crevasses and slippage on land and volcanoes and islands that rise up from the deeps: it doesn’t matter where you are on the planet, that’s what’s out there, whatever the gloss on the surface.

  LONG TIME NO SEE

  ~ Lynnel Sinclair ~

  Long time, no see

  And you look good

  So happy and content

  I remembered seeing you

  Stumbling down the street

  You were holding on

  To some guy

  He was handsome

  But mean looking

  I remembered seeing you

  Shortly thereafter

  With a bruise on your face

  I slipped and fell you said

  What a klutz I am

  Every time I saw you

  I recognized you less

  And less

  You looked so awful

  I felt helpless

  Now here you stand

  In front of me

  You look so happy

  And healthy

  I see you found your way

  Back to yourself

  I love you

  She smiled at her reflection

  In her bedroom mirror

  Her house smelled like

  Sweet grass

  She could hear her kettle

  In the kitchen

  And oh, her tea was ready

  UP THE SHANGHAI RIVER

  ~ Charles Foran ~

  Early in the afternoon the sky filled in.

  “Is the weather going to hold?” asked Earl. He’d fallen behind and couldn’t catch his breath.

  “Two more hours to camp.”

  “I won’t make it.”

  “Sure you will.”

  “I’m chilled, JB. To be bone.”

  “You don’t look too bright-eyed. To himself JB noted his friend’s quaking hands. A sick Earl—from the DTs, most likely—was of no use to him.

  Stopping, he ordered Earl to unclasp the outer pocket on his knapsack. Earl let out a whoop straight from one of the westerns shown at the movie house in Espanola. Starring John Wayne or Gary Cooper, some funny-looking guys playing the Navajo. Wrong whoop, decided JB. Wrong geography.

  “Merciful God,” said Earl after a slug of rye.

  “Not to all who beseech him,” said JB.

  Earl Judge pretended he hadn’t heard. “Raised by wolves, eh?” he finally said. “You part Indian?”

  “Most of us are. Going back a generation or two.”

  Towards dusk JB started noticing trap lines along the banks of a stream. He picked out the metal jaws buried in snow. A fox or wolf, its scent dulled by the cold, might step into them, but more likely a beaver or mink would get caught. Better the death be quick, the snow splattered. A fox could linger for days, often having tried to chew off its own limb.

  A man appeared on the path.

  “Friend,” said JB. He kept his arms crooked, the Winchester yet cradled.

  “Earl,” he said over his shoulder, “we got company.”

  The Ojibwa, a .30-30 by his side, raised his gaze. His boots and mittens, red blanket and black hat, pegged him as bush.

  “Out for moose?” said JB.

  “No moose.”

  “Too late in the season?”

  “No moose last month either.”

  “Beavers?”

  The Ojibwa gave this some thought. “You hunting?”

  “Staking claims,” said JB. “Up in Shanghai River.”

  “Don’t know the place.”

  “By a different name you do.”

  “This guy thinks he’s funny,” said Earl.

  “Friend,” said JB for Earl’s sake. “Ever been on the Mississauga Reserve near Blind River?”

  The man blinked.

  “He’s from around here,” said JB. “Likely deeper into the woods. Those are his trap lines. This is where he is going kill a moose to bring home to his family.”

  “No moose,” he repeated.

  “You’ll get one.”

  Before extending his hand JB informed the Ojibwa that they would be making camp for the night about a mile farther along. There’d be food and a fire and he was welcome to join them. The man shook JB’s hand, his grip soft, but made no effort with Earl.

  They’d resumed walking when the Ojibwa spoke again. “I shot a bear up there. Off the trail.”

  “Today?” said JB.

  “Strange it still being out. Strange finding anything out here now.”

  “Are we all you’ve found—besides the bear?” said JB.

  “The bear is my kill.”

  “What do we want with a dead bear?” said Earl.

  They went their separate ways.

  SEVEN MATCHES

  ~ Gord Downie ~

  She gave me matches

  Seven wooden matches

  She put them into a small slim glass jar

  With a screw-top lid

  I fingered that jar

  I put it in my pocket

  She said, “Can’t go into the woods without them.”

  I smiled at her and left

  And I kept them dry

  And as long as there were six

  I’d be fine

  As long as there were five

  Matches in that jar

  Mile after mile

  On the chick-chick chick-chick sound of the matches

  On the memory of her smile

  I kept them dry

  And as long as there were five

  I’d be fine

  As long as there were four

  Matches in a jar

  With a screw-top lid

  I know she did not mean to hurt my feelings

  But that’s what she did

  And I kept them dry

  And as long as there were three

  I’d be fine

  As long as there were two

  Matches in that jar.

  THE THIRD ONE

  ~ Patricia Young ~

  After class, Faith McCabe, a second year Philosophy student, jogs on the woodchip trail near her parents’ home. It’s raining. Only three o’clock but almost nightfall. Earlier, she wrote her last exam before the Christmas break. On her final stretch three masked men—no, they’re boys—step out of the bushes in front of her. Down on your knees, bitch, says the one with the knife. A fist slams into her stomach. She buckles. Falls forward. Two boys take turns, first one, then the other, but the third says No. What the fuck? says the one with the knife. No, the third one says again, and turns and lopes away. But he doesn’t go alone. Faith McCabe leaps up after him. Even as she lies bruised and bloody on the ground, even as his feet pound the woodchip trail, she flies after him. No matter how fast he runs or how far he travels, Faith McCabe is right there, riding his heels, the stone in his shoe, stitch in his side, grit in his teeth. Large as a question and close as a lover, she follows the third one to the dark end of his days.

  WATER BIRD

  ~ Patrick Lane ~

  for Rinelle Harper

  The water is slow in the long river moving toward the lake.

  Plastic bags, cigarette packs, bottles, and a girl float under the lights, the city burning around her, the huge noise of people going home from the bars, from the cafes, from the alleys and shacks.

  The girl still breathes, her wounds the wounds of a bird, a flying thing come to a broken rest in the dark waters.

  Someone is lost and the stars shine on.

  They are what we know of mercy, what we know of a lost word: love. For what else but love can
lift us from the drift?

  Surely the currents she has woken in will save us from despair.

  Surely her crawling onto the river bank can give us solace.

  No matter how injured, no matter her wounds, we are the night cry a broken water bird makes who has come at last into hands that wish to heal what a whole world in its ignorance has done.

  BECAUSE OF WHAT I DID

  A SHORT STORY IN PROGRESS

  ~ Richard Van Camp ~

  “Let me tell you what’s going to happen next,” Benny said to Lester. “I’m going to ask you three times the same question. You’ll lie. Everyone lies the first two times. And I’m going to let you.”

  “Everybody lies, boss,” Torchy smiled.

  “But it’s the third time I ask that’s important.”

  “Mmm hmm,” Torchy nodded. A muscle in his face jumped he was getting so excited.

  “Because if you lie to me the third time, we turn Flinch on you. My boy. My attack dog. Oh the things he can do.”

  “My my,” Torchy purred.

  “The last time someone lied, they got—what—thirty staples in their throat, chest, and forehead?”

  I looked away and winced at the memory of the last time I unleashed myself: I tore that man’s face into a starburst.

  “I’m connected,” Lester said, with a low growl, like a lynx in a leg hold.

  “Once upon a time you was,” Torchy grinned. “Your Aunty Bodacious has given us until nightfall to make you talk.”

  And that was when Lester knew that he was all alone in the world. All alone with us in a room with the stove elements popping, four thin knives that could bore and burn their way into anyplace, and a samurai sword. He hung his head and started to sob.

  “Where is the place they call The Farm?” Benny asked as he unsheathed his sword. “Who are the men working together to create Blood Mares? We know this is international and it’s connected to snuff and child pornography rings. We know law enforcement is probably involved—”

  Benny started rocking his chair. “No! No! No! Don’t make me tell you. Don’t. They’ll know. They know now.”

  I froze.