436
PARTISAN REVIEW
river," she says. "And the river leap t up to pick one of my fruit. " "We
are covered in leaves ," he replies , "and we are in love." In the morning
there are ten geese on the shore. The postman plays the violin.
Tim's work on the wall inspires the curiosity of the neighbors who lay
off winterizing to ask him, "What are those things!" "They're airshafts
so we can talk to the sky." "You one of those UFO freaks? " " It's going
to be an early winter this year." The work refreshes him. A smell of
cold, of cut wood, of wet cement. And hands, red and dry, lifting a
cinderblock into place. And the wise farm girl with incredible blue
eyes, bringing him an apron full of eggs. Ava asks the neighbors in for
soup cooked on the new electric range. All through the meal Tim
makes eyes at the farm girl and they meet in the moonlight. She cuddles
roosters and he buttons his shirt, saying, "Ava and I will shortly be
returning to the city."
One day Ava is on the roof piling cinderblocks on the tower and Tim is
at the range making soup. He hears a thump and comes out to see a
hawk lift Ava from the shingles and sail into the blue storms of
approaching winter. From the way she lifts her arms over her head as
she is lifted into the air, and the wind shoots through her eyes, Tim
knows Ava is in love. Then, while the red farm machinery grunts in the
black earth and the telephone wires hum in the wind, Ava is nowhere
to be found. While Tim's hands are whiteknuckl ed on the tabl e edge
and ice manacles form on the legs of the geese and ice drifts on the lake
like coagulated fat, Ava is nowhere to be found .
Last week that field was green and now yellow stalks lean and rattle.
Little towers of frozen dew rise on flimsy stilts above the earth. We
search the insect husks on the lake beach , but no Ava. The silver shafts
of the naked pines stick lancelike into the the air, wisps of snow scurry
quietly on the road before the frenzied headlights of the farm machin–
ery, Tim wanders in the smoky light by the side of the road, but no Ava.
And there are feathers in the snow but no footprints, and the geese
which arrive from now on die with their feet in the ice. And of the
fourteen geese that go south, seven freeze to death in Lexington,
Kentucky. The unstuck westerlies ravage North America, bringing
glaciers to Texas and ice forests to the windows of Georgia, and frozen
snot to the cilia of Tim 's nostrils as he unpacks the orange VW in the
city, to find Ava making soup on their electric range.. .. No words are
exchanged.
