This Wicked Tongue

Here beginneth a short treatise of contemplation taken from the Book of Alice Nash, Ancress of Shere, c. AD 1372.*

- Elise Levine

Before we leave, we tell You — smoke kestrel, thumb sky. But since friend Nance’s murder, our words a poor magic mashed to this world. Then we are of four knees. We sneeze and admit Mam’s relief at our leave-taking. She wants no mob here, poxed cursers seeking to lay blame and wreak vengeance for our imagined sins. We smudge a tear from young Bea’s cheek. Boy, we say to young Robert. A curtsy for Pa mute from the Long Wars. We hold back a sneeze. The sun fights a cloud. The old donkey’s nose dabbles air, and he twitches his flied flank. From cousins Matilda and Joan, one hill over, two quick waves. We scan the second hill, the third. No Nance.

We sling up our pack.

WIND ON THE mountain passes. Yesterday our feet froze and thawed and a swift hare defied a hawk. Yesterday we sang. We chopped firewood and slept hot.

Today we stumble, rock and root. Bound breasts ache. We miss Mam fretting over Bea’s coarse braids, Robert tossing his cap, off to tend the ewes. We miss the ewe called Rose.

We bear on. The hold of which Nance spoke lies in Surrey, a fortnight or more southeastward. But by evening our flasks dry. Even the donkey sucks his teeth. We pray You all night.

But our pleas stir the ash, and at grey light, the donkey heaves. We stroke his flattened ears, lean against the sweating neck. He buckles and barks, and sad to say we coax him forward with a stick while we trod alongside, the path sour with moss. Crows rattle bare branches. Their cries banner our thin thoughts.

At high sun, we sink, lick damp from rocks, pound dirt with fists. Call You with sorry sounds. Thistle girt, boat corn — we call You. But You are dark striking.

We remind You — to You we come. But You must already know. And our sorry sounds grow.