Bramah and the Beggar Boy Read online

  Long yards of Indigenous dialects.

  These were unearned, sacred, and Forbidden.

  Pottery-painting-prints-jewelry-tattoos.

  Weavers, smiths, warriors. Edges and borders.

  Thresholds, after-parties, covert ops, slant.

  Vast armies on a darkling plain. Empire.

  Land masses: geology and shape-shifting.

  Glaciers. Earthquakes. Tsunamis and currents.

  The town of towns. The Rann of Kutch. Raindrops.

  The Lance of Kanana. Mother Lakshmi.

  Aunty Maria. Aunty Magda, too.

  All the women of the Wishing Well. Winds:

  North, South, East, West, circles, squares eroding—

  Tundra, shield, meadows. Green hills far away.

  Bogs and peat. Granite. Oceans, rivers, tides.

  The Moon, her many mistresses, singing:

  layers, fragments, communion and makeup

  adornment, dresses, high heels and barefoot.

  Scheherazade, one thousand tales within——

  Perimeter, that Detention Centre:

  just Outside, where roving Beggar Boys sang,

  Come ye in, airborne, after, masks and hoods,

  masks and hoods.

  Time.

  The Map They Steal

  For You Who May Return, if without soap

  barter with Aunty Agatha at the farm.

  If in Pacifica, retrace your steps:

  Take the Albion Ferry , then by foot

  before the airlines shut down all the flights.

  The Things They Take

  Bramah:—those go down first, yeah, before you fum-i-gate

  that Beggar Boy smiles, nods his head, pulls his mask tight

  gloved fingers rip cotton rags, turpentine

  all their finds, dipped, wiped, stored, to be bartered.

  Bramah, smiling, her brown hands to the boy’s:

  a packet of letters, tied up with faded red string:

  I did miss you, then.

  I am resolved to write,

  no matter what happens.

  Inscription tools and surface material:

  I think about these a lot.

  Discarded letters found in an oak box

  Your hand crushing mine, our lips never kissed.

  Grandmother’s Instruction

  Later, past midnight, around the campfire

  Bramah’s grandmother calls everyone in,

  closer to the flames. The Beggar Boy sits,

  his hands pull on that packet of letters

  his fingers do the reading——

  shapes rubbed, upward strokes: dots, crossed ts leaning

  not even his lips move, not ever, him silent as the night.

  Discarded letters found in an oak box

  Your hand crushing mine, our lips never kissed.

  Everyone laughs then, watching the boy’s fingers,

  and Grandmother says,

  Bramah, next time be sure to search the farmhouse.

  Video Surveillance: Investigator’s Logbook

  By Order of Consortium: camera numbers defaced.

  Locator: Pacifica Region, Outside Perimeter

  In the year of the reign 2XXX

  Video Surveillance Monitor Status: On

  Partial Recording, Retrieved: Farmhouse.

  Squadron leader, Guards of the Fifth Gate (name):

  Funny how many of you posted in here.

  We was told the lock needed opening fast.

  Did you stay with her the whole time, then, eh—

  All them cameras we tested worked just fine.

  So I guess she just did some spell on them?

  Bramah and the Beggar Boy Find an Old Oak Box

  Her long black braid, her locksmith tools, clipped.

  His gap-toothed smile, his no-name runners ripped.

  What is it? he asked—they lifted the lid—

  inside parchment, codes printed on paper

  fragments—

  a handful of dusty disks

  a book, letters and many other things:

  rubbed, held, stolen, ransomed—tied up with string,

  brought back, bartered from the Before-Time—when—

  Outside Perimeter, the boys chanted:

  Right as rain, good as new,

  Jumped the fence, you should too—

  Jumped the fence, you should too—

  The Letter They Find

  Dear Future Survivors:

  Our only defence against gas, frayed scarves

  no mistaking the colour of our skin—

  We would search October and April, then—

  We would find no traces of doors or gates

  or doors only where locks turned, then jammed, eyes

  scanned, for re-entry, or bribes, or bodies—

  We are sending you this message, in case—

  Although you are three light years away:

  We found these fragments, an old oak box,

  it’s a strange one, no matter how often emptied

  something always at the bottom

  no matter how ill-treated, no scuff marks mar

  this plain smooth lid: opened to this letter

  see the writing, almost disappeared:

  Your hand crushing mine, our lips never kissed.

  Partial Transcript: The Rehabilitated Scientists

  We’ve not seen again the likes of them here.

  We renounce facts and now wander with myth.

  We swiped, before the blast, you better, too

  those signs pockmarked into walls;

  we renounce replication or numbers.

  We only try our best to help the sick.

  Photographs of Prisoners

  We walked knees bloody

  masks torn; coats thrown

  down to the bare stone ground—

  no chance of ever going back,

  none at all: .

  our scribes wrote: .

  , be it resolved .

  We did not ask for mercy

  that Grand Hall, we heard them:

  . Their sayings,

  night after night, and—above:

  Cold-Heart-Wolf Moon,

  laughing .

  calling us, our damned visions,

  close, closer: .

  See you inside, this we sang out as—

  Court Records of the Lost

  Our skulls cracked on that granite

  blood flowing—if at night, a traveller:

  we knew him as the Lord of the Taverns,

  girls flocked to him; women fell—

  In his hands a book of magic, black bound:

  El-Khemi, and geologic Time—

  all the great sagas, copied to disc, thrown down:

  the Western Ghats, rivers, far vistas—

  Epics written in blood-ink, then singed wisps—

  No escape or running free:

  his gaze, his hand strong enough to crush men.

  Gods watched from a stone bench, seated, rolling

  dice, their laughter, thunder—

  how they longed to see such peals:

  Era, epoch, eons later, and only that one time—

  Although we had been gone for years

  eyes shining, our rough hands cupped a seedling

  ankles shackled, we bent to kiss our earth.

  That stretch of coastline, laser-cut and fading——

  Bill of Lading for Masks

  Eastbound train jammed full of unmasked people

  glances, those indeterminate voices—

  Faster, faster, the snow-covered ground rose

  higher than any tower, North Wind stinging

  Her shawl undone, arms clutching a newborn.

 
We watched in silence as she tossed him up

  already stilled, pale small fingers frozen

  chilblains on his small toes, we had to burn

  right there in the centre of everyone

  oil-can rust, coal grate, orange flames flickering——

  And then we went our separate ways, the night

  steps resolving into steps, further from——

  No one to see our broken smiles, falling

  We’d remember—the power of the sun.

  Scratched Disc: Recording of the Captives

  The men said to each other,

  “When your house is on fire,

  you got to scream—”

  The women hunched in trenches, ready to

  shoot, fighters incarcerated, they said

  no use to reboot that power station.

  Those supply chains disrupted, all our food.

  Together they called, for years evermore,

  it were the Battle of Kingsway, it were——

  The Notes of the Beekeeper’s Daughter

  They burnt all our hives; they killed my mother

  With her last breath, she made me write these down

  She taught us edge-magic, twilight and dusk

  dawn or the hours just before, tilted

  entry points, lines, horizon opening:

  We’d race to the West, to time the sunset

  We’d kneel, eastward, even when overcast

  She told us to spin, turn, counted centres

  the gap between thumb and index, sextant

  in silence or in song, we stepped forward

  daughters of the light, our breath, vibrations

  that carrier landing amid gunfire

  kneeling and blindfolded, against a wall

  three women, three men, their heads bowed, hands tied

  She told us: fingertips to throat, temples

  Circular, soft gaze at the moment of—

  Oracle, beeswax built, tended by bees

  Palace, those golden corners, six-sided

  common and circular fit: tensile cell

  those combs hanging wild, hunted, split open

  heavy with nectar and pollen, straight lines

  on the surface of—round, waggle, tipped scent

  flower to flower, thy sweetness, a trail

  irregular, murmuring to the sun

  o new queen, o dowager drone, take flight

  your cocoon spun, sealed royally and milked,

  swarmed, a drone to mate, hatched each thousand egg:

  time, then, the turning of this earth, ripped sting

  ox born, honey fed, forever to sing.

  The Map of the Last Knight

  Midnight, a train station, and outside

  candles in a shop window, shadows

  torrents of rain, cobblestones, lone gunman

  sunrise, cathedral and a crow calls three

  letters written, tiny, script, red ink, smeared pages

  that Tower bathhouse, crescent moon and waxing

  dripping to red, sealed parchment, trembling hands.

  Believer, they were told those secret names.

  Resisters, run. Run faster, they all cried.

  His knife, sharp, light, edge to fold, pulled tight and

  gasps cut off at the quick, footsteps, cold stone:

  weavers and their spells, waterfalls dancing

  cavern underground, from where we would return.

  Video Remnant of the Migrants

  We set sail, star-guided, messages sent

  below deck, nimble fingers curled paper

  pushed spirals, long-necked apertures, green glass

  once we were a part of the known world and yet,

  our skies a torment, we could not see her.

  Cyclones, the ravages of fault lines, cracked,

  open——and we fell in———

  The Parchment Scroll

  Glued together, parchment pieces as one

  stained scroll, unrolled long, rough tattered edges

  vellum frontispiece attached, faint inscriptions:

  Unfurled

  Limitless circumference, we made this world

  made this book and this book called you to us.

  Six tapers lit, while outside, east winds howled.

  Stroke by stroke, brush dipped into henna warmed—

  Who will part our hair—soft, silken, to meet bone.

  Bright morning sun: by evening, snow falls fast—

  Faster, the years spooling ever backwards

  with soft steps we will walk again, garden bound.

  Banjaxed, shunned, cast out, we’ve burned our bridges

  crossed, over, into——fled Perimeter.

  We’ve longed for refuge: to sit, talk, drink—smoke

  drifted, spiralling past our cold fingers.

  Each flight from Mars, awakening, then

  to find this oak box, these letters of men.

  Chased to the Gate of the Spring Portal, 2050

  Roaming deserted streets, girls sang letters

  Spin, rotate, tilting and orbital, Our Sun—

  Come ye, Aunty Pandy, sweep and cough

  Come ye, Aunty Pandy, sidestep, and masked.

  Oh, for skies on lockdown, air fresh, leaves green.

  Homeward bound we promise, our hands still clean.

  Girls and boys, soon to become beggars, call,

  IED baby, your bombs, our arms, boom!

  IED baby, inside, outside, boom!

  The Great Abandonment

  It were a coming together of drought.

  It were a virus let loose, lock and key,

  those protein receptors, encoded and—

  It were fissures in the earth, deep fault lines.

  It were mass migrations, lost belongings

  that child set down, the waves of a beach.

  It were any number of armed militias,

  roaming as temperatures soared, then the ice.

  Those roaring forest fires, farms let go.

  We kept telling ourselves, unprecedented.

  Over our shoulders, long looks at the past.

  Those Beggar Boys with their songs and their paint.

  Aunty Maria, her seeds, and her bees.

  She searched for scientists, we watched them bleed.

  The Five Catastrophes

  By water, the soul

  Tsunami, seepage

  Cascading, eroded

  By fire, the eyes

  Scorched, singed

  Blasted, burned

  To melt—

  By earth, the body

  Trembling, split

  Collapsed, on knees

  Tumbled and crushed.

  By wind, the voice

  Blown, sifting syllables

  Winnowed circumference

  Made square by four

  Ripped, torn, worn, howl—

  It were the Battle of Kingsway, and after————

  Followers of Aunty Maria

  We who would walk Perimeter, those crows

  a chorus, under feathers fluffed. Outside,

  Rentalsman, honey locust, bare stands,

  the thinnest trunks, Consortium-approved,

  roots shallow

  so as to not disturb—in our pockets

  remnants, true felted, small quilt squares for masks,

  Aunty Maria of Tyne and Church, all the streets now gone.

  Fissured earth, snow a poison, yellowed edges, the shanty dogs

  who would run to tear, what she held and rubbed

  sewn circles, piece by piece—oh patch and mend—

  Outside Perimeter no matter when

  not enough tear gas to stop th
e screaming,

  a group of street children found an oak box.

  Someone told someone else: let’s ransom this.

  And did they find a way to cart that box?

  One gang to haul, another to throw stones.

  Guards at Detention Centre C, laughing.

  Hardly a glance.

  Aunty Maria’s Clandestine Harvest

  In those days, she carried always,

  The Book—at her hip,

  My Garman,

  she called it, banned.

  All the Beggar Boys called out, Aunty M!

  All those Sword Girls smiled and said,

  Come fight us for favour, come lose your limbs.

  No guards of the gate ever dared laugh.

  In this way, distractions, to allow for:

  cherished, when gathering Ninebark,

  in star-shaped hairs, imported leaves

  Physocarpus spirea,

  city opening along one seam,