by Claudia Kessel
The Farm: Slivers of Memory
Salamanders in Silos
Summer afternoons, my cousins and I played in the loft of the old barn, leaping from bale to bale, avoiding the holes where our legs could fall through and the wooden beams where pigeons left white tar droppings, always ending up in the abandoned silo—voices echoing off the tall, concrete cylinder, we poked around the pungent dankness to find the rotting carcass of a sparrow, turning over slimy stones in search of the cool, black skin of salamanders.
Crabapples
We would gather them—fallen from the short, misshapen trees near the house, shriveled pink and green in our palms, and collect them in the scooped cloth of our shirts, running back and forth with the hard, sugared jewels to the paddock where the horses knickered in anticipation—their velvet, whiskered muzzles sniffing our nervous fingers.
Hay Baling Day
Always a crowd— grownups and children trailed by a herd of dogs, muscular teenage boys from the neighbor’s farm, sweat dampening the backs of shirts, twine cutting into our fingers as we grabbed the bales regurgitated from the rattling machine, one after the other, and our regret in forgetting to wear long pants as the dry grass rectangles scraped our thighs red and swollen, and my father, flushed in his drenched wife-beater, anxiously checked the sky for dark clouds.
Tire Swing
Near the road, the hill dipped abruptly into a basin, and among the wind-blown grasses lived an oak tree, larger than God, older than life, and from one of his broad, cragged limbs swung a tire on a rope that rocked us for years and years, that twirled generations of children, as we pushed each other through August breezes and sudden rainstorms and shimmering days where dragonflies vibrated in the sun’s breath, until the day it bent and hollowed, and men came with their trucks and ropes, and it all ended with the screaming of saws.
Wild Black Raspberries
With the fervor of missionaries, we hunted the hidden bits of barbarian sweetness, scouring the line of trees near the beehives that bordered the alfalfa field, arms slathered with mosquito repellent, gauging how deeply to press our bodies into the thorny tangle, reaching for the farthest plump droplets of deep purple, which slipped easily between the crevices of our fingers, stained our palms, and ended their short lives on our holy tongues
Farmhouse
Built at the turn of the century, the handsome square of orange brick still presided over the barn and fields, with white-trimmed windows stretching from ceiling to floor, peering at the road that had transformed from dirt to gravel to asphalt, where tires had replaced wagon wheels, the porch cracked and sagging, the grimy carpet muddied by farmers’ boots and stinking with the urine of generations of cats, as the screen door frame trembled with each careless bang—endless summer lingered there, in rooms where the incessant spinning of fans made no difference.
Sledding Hill
We could hardly wait for the weak, pink light of daybreak on those bitter winter mornings, despite the carnivorous cold that devoured ungloved hands, before wrapping ourselves like mummies in scarves and snow pants, lugging our plastic sleds up the steep hill, careening feet first and later head first into the snow bank, sliding again and again, the ecstatic surge of fear, the mute euphoria of newly-fallen snow that absorbed our shrieks, snow layered over the world like thick, egg-beaten meringue, our limbs weighed down in a new-found gravity, as we explored the novel white moonscape like curious astronauts, until someone lost a boot, or our red cabbage leaf ears pulsed with pain, or when the snow found our most vulnerable parts—wrists, ankles, necks—and then inside, the ritual of peeling off socks and gloves, and the impatient waiting as our damp garments dried on the radiator.
Country Road Cemetery
Down the road lined with queen anne’s lace, marsh marigold, and chicory’s indigo flares, we wandered in our bored summer evenings past the tight rows of corn and tilting mailboxes to the hidden cemetery, under the shade of cedars whose roots skewed the gravestones, and we traced names on granite, searching for Civil War veterans with their aluminum stars, seeking the faded ones with the oldest dates, the dead children, the graves of forgotten farmers’ wives long abandoned of plastic flowers, and lingered on the name of the elderly woman, Violet Cooper, who died in our farmhouse and whose ghost we knew haunted us.
Honey Locusts
Sometimes I would picnic alone under the shade of the slim-trunked honey locusts whose leaflets chopped the light into tender bits and quivered in the syrupy afternoon breeze, sun cutting through their crevices like the warmth of a fire though a crocheted blanket, I lay close to where the fawns hid in their trampled grass beds—a place where death was not a demon, but an arboreal mother enfolding us in her pleated blanket.
Truthful Obituary
I.
He was born on a spring day to a man and a woman. He lived in a certain town and graduated high school and then college, excelling at his studies. After falling in love with his college sweetheart, they were married on a bright summer day. They spent some number of wonderful years together. He was a devoted husband and father, and later a doting grandfather. He had a fulfilling career, enjoyed a lifelong hobby, and was a respected member of his church and community. He entered into eternal life one day in winter, surrounded by friends and family who loved him.
He was a child of God.
II.
He was born on a Tuesday in March, during a time of hardship and self-reliance, which gave him character, a steely work ethic, an authenticity. He played in the woods with his beloved brother and tormented his pigtailed sister. His mother was all softness and comfort, his father strength and uprightness. Grandparents lived on the floor above and spoke little English. His childhood was reading The Hardy Boys in the attic, neighborhood misadventures with friends, Friday violin lessons, catching frogs in the creek, church on Sundays, camping with his fellow Boy Scouts. The family’s devotion and his tight-knit immigrant community built a man of unwavering confidence, although his Slavic genes bequeathed a tendency to melancholy.
He missed the draft by two years; by the time he came of age, the war had ended. He married young and, after years of intense study, launched enthusiastically into a career in history and university education. He achieved a rare level of brilliance in his field and wrote and published impressively. Throughout his life, he attracted a following of students who admired and adored him. He touched the lives and inspired the minds of many.
In his early years, the children kept coming. He and his wife, whom he barely knew, were strangers passing in the kitchen. Amidst the noise and chaos of home, the screeching babies and dirty dishes, he found quiet corners to scribble poetry and play violin, which renewed him. He worked constantly, and to avoid his family, spent his few remaining hours cultivating his garden. Sometimes his favorite daughter trailed him like an ardent puppy. There were always projects—the pond, the tool shed, the woodshop, the orchard. He believed he was giving his children a decent childhood, although he often felt more fondness for his dog than his raucous and petulant sons. He ignored his wife’s alcoholism.
He fell in love many times with his students. He cheated on his wife twice, regretting the first time but not the second. Each Sunday, he attended mass and prayed for forgiveness. At the peak of his career, he left his wife, who had become sad and drunk and fat, for a student twenty years his junior. She was charming and buxom, strong-willed and opinionated, his wife’s opposite. His children had become angry teenagers who quickly fled the house. They rarely called or visited unless they needed money. His young wife fulfilled him, and they built a handsome home together, a garden with hens. His university honored him with a prestigious award at the culmination of his career.
Once he retired, begrudgingly, his life became thinner and smaller. His arthritis made playing the violin painful, the plants he cultivated withered in his garden, his poems left unfinished on his desk. His children disliked each other and fought viciously between themselves. Two of them stopped speaking to him. He rarely remembered the names of his grandchildren. Regrets accumulated and he faded from his students’ thoughts. He felt anxious when his wife left him alone in the house.
His memory declined; he became a shadow of himself. His wife drove him to church every morning where he prayed more urgently, but never for his true sins. He spent his last days sitting in his armchair and watching the birds, feeling confused, blank, drained. He died on a Saturday in February. Two of his children were absent at his funeral. His wives and one daughter mourned him. His books gathered dust on a shelf.
He was a child of God.