molly.com
Thursday 26 August 2004
sudden fiction at 29,000 feet
Carnivore
HAVING ALWAYS EATEN meat the idea of taking another life for nourishment appealed to her growing logic. When she was in her teens she knew of a man who would take her fishing. Together, they would catch small mouth bass out of the St. Lawrence River. Easily crushing earthworms onto hooks, she would swing her thick arms wide, waiting with a patience unknown elsewhere in her life as the fish would first nip then bite down full upon the bait.
“There is a moment where you have to count” he told her, looking at her with a not-quite smile. “One, two, three, four – now!” She’d lock the reel and snap back the rod with all her young strength and prepare for the struggle. “Small mouth bass are fighters” he said, jutting out a weak chin and knowing he’d rather struggle with her, though she always turned away.
They’d fish. Get stoned. Reel in tired bass and pull out hooks from gasping lips and bleeding eyes. She learned to hold the fish tight in her small broad hands until life passed out in curls and wisps of something like smoke, but not smoke. She felt sad only later eating the delectable flesh and feeling an uncertain fire catch in her throat, wanting now to cry out for the nameless fish whose fading heartbeat dying in her hands flowed into her body instead.
One time, they tromped through the woods in Pennsylvania with drunken friends and dogs, carrying shotguns and surprising the abundant deer. When Mike McCann shot at one and it fell, she ran forward unthinking of her friends and their reckless aim, grasping at the deer’s neck where the bullet had pierced, crying on its warm dying body with legs kicking and eyes wide, staring directly into hers as the final twitches and sharp breaths of death unraveled. She ate its rich, sweet meat later and smelled the young deer’s blood, thinking how, much like her own blood this blood would stay in her nostrils and mind forever.
Many years later these thoughts of creatures dying in her hands pass through a tired mind. She is standing in front of an Alaskan grizzly, stuffed and mountainous, with a skull of an unrecognizable animal at its feet. Upon close examination, she sees between the bear’s fur right down to its flesh
and follicles, its pores and breathing parts captured waxy and yellow and not at all alive.
This is how I will be, she thinks. One day, I too will be a still creature, with my soul like smoke curling away from my body, with the fire of death opening my throat raw and my eyes wide in search of indeterminate comfort, with my last gasp wondering: Who did I nourish, who did I feed, where in this circle of breath and ash did I give enough of myself to warrant eternal peace?
Filed under: poetry & fiction
Posted by: Molly | 20:19 | Comments (6)
You should fly more often.
this is strong and unique and creative
Your writing is impressive and inspiring.
This is how I will be, she thinks. One day, I too will be a still creature, with my soul like smoke curling away from my body, with the fire of death opening my throat raw and my eyes wide in search of indeterminate comfort, with my last gasp wondering: Who did I nourish, who did I feed, where in this circle of breath and ash did I give enough of myself to warrant eternal peace?