Like Water on Stone (4 page)

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Authors: Dana Walrath

BOOK: Like Water on Stone
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Sosi
I’m far too young
to wed, I know.
But if Papa would only
speak to Vahan’s father,
then we could sit
side by side
at church.
Side by side,
we would touch
the ground in worship,
kiss our own hands,
then forehead,
chest,
left,
right,
and our hands
would rest
on our hearts.
I can see our wedding tree,
almost my size,
with seven slender branches
laden with strings of
apple, pear, and raisin,
their tips joined
through a single
noor
,
a pomegranate fruit,
curled ribbons flowing
from where they meet.
Papa spoke with
baron
Takoushjian,
a man with six daughters,
about a bride for Misak.
Six Armenian daughters
and still he said no,
despite the mill,
despite Misak,
handsome, tall, and strong.
When she heard,
Mama’s lips sealed
as tight as a canning jar.
At night I hear her
rasping whisper
saying to Papa,
again and again,
“I warned you this would happen
if Anahid married Asan.
He’s a good fine man, as is his father,
but they are Kurds by blood,
and we should marry our own.”
Shahen
Like water on stone, lessons fall on me.
Again it’s St. Mesrop, who sat in a cave,
and the angel who gave him the alphabet.
And back and forth, in time with the clock,
Father Manoog waves his head like a Sunday censer
Through crumbs in his beard, he spits out old stories,
each repetition a black ink inscription proving again
that my fate
—
jagadakirus
—
written on my forehead,
is not here with priests.
Each book, each map, each history lesson
sends me to my uncle in America.
The chants of yogurt vendors approaching
tell me this school day will finally end.
Turkish calls
—
“AY-RAN, Ay-ran, ay-ran”
—
change to Armenian
—
“TAHN, Tahn, tahn”
—
as they near.
But I don’t need a cool yogurt drink.
My letter, from my uncle, my
keri
, is my treat.
Dismissed, I run down the mountain path
to my spot in the rocks, open to the river,
hidden from church and from God’s prying eyes.
There, in a crack in the stone,
protected from the wind and rain,
one folded paper holds
all of New York Harbor.
The boats, the statue,
the buildings that scrape the sky
like mountaintops come alive
from Keri’s letter.
I can see beyond pale pink rocks,
rising above the Euphrates,
all the way to the ocean.
Below me, the great green stripe of river
I will cross to go home
fills with friends and laughter
instead of New York boats.
They’re Turks, I know,
but sure, I’ll play.
Papa does the same with music.
Sosi
Anahid
Anahid
jan
,
my sister bride,
when did you know
that you loved Asan?
Ohhhh, Sosi
jan
!
Are you in love?
No. Not me. No.
I’m too young.
I’m just curious
and I miss you.
Curious.
Yes, curious.
Look at you,
growing up, Sosi
jan
,
though Shahen
seems a little stuck.
I know.
I will tell you.
It came by surprise.
He was always there
every time Papa
had a night of music.
He was like a brother
or a cousin
to Misak and Kevorg,
as much as to me.
I was always busy
helping Mama
serve the food.
But one night,
baba
Kaban played
a
duduk
melody;
you know how it gets
under your skin
and everything
inside you shimmers?
I looked up and
Asan’s eyes met mine.
It was like the
duduk
,
but even stronger.
Just a look?
Whatever the eye sees,
the heart won’t forget.
Ardziv
Water and wheel
glistened like gems.
The mill sang its own song,
the low, slow wail
of the wheel as it turned,
the steady pulse
of water on wood,
the rising pitch
as grain became flour,
the rough rock rumble
of the first coarse grind.
It was high summer.
Mounds of apricots
turned one roof golden,
like sun-drenched feather tips.
Shahen and Sosi carried basket
after basket of apricots
from the trees
that lined the river,
Mariam trailing behind them.
I lingered by the river
to study the fruit’s
perfect oval shape,
like the velvet pads
on a rabbit’s foot.
The seam running up its side
like a cleft between
a lapin nose and mouth,
the indentation
from where stem meets fruit
so like a hollow place
in the soft belly
of a mammal new born.
Once the roof was filled,
Shahen lay back
and stared up
to where I circled
above treetops,
his gaze fixed
on the blue sky.
Shahen
Sosi
In America, Keri says,
I will go to a school
with hundreds
of students
How could you know
all their names?
I can learn names
by the thousands.
Papa never said
you’re going.
And why do you
want to, anyway?
Hundreds of boys,
all the same,
like the apricots
in this heap.
And I’ve got to pit
every one
while you dream.
Not boys, Sosi.
Young men.
You wait.
I’ll climb
to the crown
of Lady Liberty,
the giant statue.
I’ll shout
their names
over New York
Harbor.
This one is Adam.
His pit
comes right out.
This one is Eve.
Her pit
comes out, too.
Noah’s a bit soft,
overripe.
His pit will stick.
I’ll take care
of Noah for you.
Good catch.
Keri says that
from her torch
I will see houses
side by side
spread across
the land
like vines
in an orchard.
Just houses?
No earth?
How will you eat?
Keri says food
comes to the city
by boat and train.
Pah! With food
brought out
from storage
it will be winter
every day.
No, Sosi.
Summer.
Apricot summer,
every day.
Winter
without
you.
Mariam
Bird,
trchoon
.
Stick and wings.
Stick, swan, wave.
Stick, stick, smile.
Stick, snake.
Stick, stick.
Small smile, swan down, smile.
Big smile.
I am a writing bird.
Shahen
Papa
Keri was just my age
when he went
to America.
There were pogroms.
It made sense, then,
for him to go,
though it broke
your mother’s heart.
Papa, pogroms
will come again.
Where is there a tree
not shaken
by the wind?
It makes sense
for me to go.
Keri says
there are free schools
for all the youth
of the city.
If I wait
I’ll be too old.
Leave this land
where music flows?
And break again
your mother’s heart?
No, Shahen.
And anyway,
you study here
with the priest
already.
Pah!
With Father Manoog,
it’s always the same.
Two full years
and I’ve learned
nothing new.
Shahen,
open your eyes.
Father Manoog
prepares you
for college
in Kharpert.
You’re looking
for a donkey
while sitting
on its back.
A donkey!
Exactly, Papa.
Give a donkey
flowers to smell,
and he eats them.
A donkey can swim
seven different strokes,
but the moment
he sees the water,
he forgets them all.
I want more
than donkeys.
You want.
You want.
Always you want.
Stop wanting,
my son,
and then your eyes
will open.
Sosi
Apricots with pierced skin or bruised flesh
boil on a low flame, to make a sweet auburn paste.
Mama stirs them as they thicken.
Juices float from the black pot and perfume the air.
Mama tells me again of the feast
before her brother left for America.
This lets her think of Shahen.
Should he go or should he stay?
The feast is always bittersweet.
Three lambs slaughtered and roasted in a pit,
pilaf rich with pine nuts and dried cherries.
She says she couldn’t eat a bite. If it were me, I could,
though Shahen should not go.
If he does, I will write him letters
that make his belly yearn
for the feasts of home.
Mama was already the mother of three
when Keri left. Misak toddling,
Kevorg just brand-new. Anahid five,
like Mariam now. She is scratching again
in the earth with her stick
while Mama tends the black pot’s bubbling mixture,
her eye ready for the moment just before it hardens,
so our
bastegh
will stay solid-soft,
like leather,
when spread in thin sheets to dry.
Dusted with ground sugar
and rolled compact,
one December bite
will fill me with summer.
Apricots spread thin on the tray,
an auburn sunset sea.
I pull a strip from the nearest edge,
so thin no one can tell,
and squeeze it
in my palm
into a small, warm ball
that hides inside my cheek
till it melts.
Golden sweetness fills all of me,
like just one glance
from Vahan.
Ardziv
Green mountain fields turned into gold
as wheatgrass curled and ripened.
Harvest songs rose from the fields
as sickles slashed the stalks.
The Kurdish
beys
took in their tithe.
The peasants kept the rest.
Turks and Kurds hauled in their crops
and left the mill with haste.
They would not chat
with those whom they called
gavour
s.
Armenian farmers lingered.
Hot summer nights, the roof became
the summer dining room.
Mountain winds swept away
the heat of the day
and music filled the air.
Papa hobbled up the stairs,
his left leg dragged behind.
But both his hands,
they worked just right,
pressing the neck,
plucking the strings,
the quill tip tucked
between thumb and first finger,
the plume end flowing
out from under
his curved palm.
One August dusk, as the sun hung low
and colors filled the sky,
Mama and Sosi spread a rich red cloth
across the roof floor,
with platters of food upon the cloth:
rice wrapped tight with leaves from grapevines,
cheese fibers pulled so thin they might line a nest,
flat baked bread from fresh-ground wheat,
the black pot filled with green-pepper
dolma
,
apricots, olives, and skewers of lamb,
juice of the meat still running red.
Misak and Kevorg
splashed in the stream
to clear their hair of wheat dust.
Shahen carried Mariam
on his shoulders,
holding her round knees
as he darted down the path
to greet the guests.
Mariam flapped her arms
above him
like a baby bird,
unbending her knees
and rising
at the sight of Anahid,
who quickened her step
when she saw them.
I flew in quite close,
not believing my eyes
at the sight of her husband
and his parents, behind her.
They wore head scarves
and prayer shawls.
This was a family of Kurds!
Kurds who pray with the drum caps,
bowing south five times each day.
Young Asan, the husband of Anahid,
his parents, Kaban and Palewan.
In his arms Kaban carried
two pipe instruments:
a long, straight
duduk
and a
zurna
with a bell at its base,
both made from the wood
of an apricot tree,
hollowed and holed,
blown through double reeds.
I’ve heard them both before.
The
zurna
’s reed
is a thin wheat leaf
rolled tight.
Its sound pierces the air.
But the
duduk
,
with its flat, loose reed,
makes a sad, sweet sound,
like a call to a loved one
about to take flight
to a distant land.
Shahen set Mariam down on the ground.
He kissed each guest
in turn on both cheeks.
Palewan placed a fine plate of sweets
in his hands, twenty tiny nests,
four by five, in neat rows,
made of fine-cut dough
filled with ground green nuts
swimming in sticky syrup.
“
Digin
Palewan,” Shahen said.
“I dream about your
kadayif
.”
“There’s no
kadayif
like this in America,
I’m sure,” she replied.
“Then I will have to eat my dreams when I go.”
Back toward the house, Mariam walked
and then flew, suspended
between the hands of Anahid and Palewan.
Such hugging and laughter
up on the roof, sharing the meal
like one family.
Imagine!
Kurds and Armenians together,
as if falcons and eagles
had just become one.
Last light faded
from the sky as they ate,
but surprises did not end.
Another lone man
came up the path,
with a curious slanted walk.
He pressed and pushed to arrive,
leading with his heart,
a
dumbek
drum, its sides inlaid
with mother-of-pearl,
held tight against his body.
His arm squeezed the drum’s waist,
the goatskin taut
across its top.
But something pulled him
from the backs of his legs
as he moved forward.
A round drum cap
on his head said
no mistaking it:
this Mustafa
was a Turk!
Imagine!
Like falcons and hawks
right inside my nest.
It was one of them,
a falcon or a hawk,
it had to have been,
who came to my nest
after the drum cap
shot my mate.
Tucked into rock
high on a ledge,
the nest could be reached
only by one with wings.
I had left them alone,
the young ones.
I had no choice.
Their mouths
were always open,
open shut,
open shut,
their flight feathers
not yet full.
I had waited in the nest
till I spied
a plump gray rabbit.
Within minutes
I was back,
my beak full
of flesh
for them.
But the nest
was already
empty.
Hidden by night now,
I dropped down
to low branches
as the music began.
Soothing music,
music soothing my sore heart.
My quill plucked
sweet sounds
from the strings
of the
oud
,
drawing me in.
Shahen too.
Mustafa’s steady hand
beat his
dumbek
.
Kaban’s cheeks
emptied, then filled,
the
duduk
sound unceasing
with his constant breath.
Lydian melodies like oil flowed.
Mother tongues in unison blending
thick umber of Turkish coffee,
Armenian apricots, ginger ripe,
blue Kurdish moonlight above us.
Misak and Kevorg stood
arms out, hands on shoulders,
catching the beat of the song,
the
tamzara
, with their step.
One
—
two
—
three,
stomp, stomp.
One
—
two
—
three,
stomp, stomp.
Asan joined the line, now an arc,
Mama and Palewan, between them.
One
—
two
—
three,
stomp, stomp.
Shahen did not dance.
He had eyes only for my quill.
His lips turned up
as Papa pulled
my quill across the string.
But as the song ended,
Shahen jumped up.
Sosi, too.
They pulled Anahid
to her feet
to make her dance
with Asan next.
The young couple
wound around each other
like eagles courting,
though one of them had falcon blood,
talons locked,
cartwheeling through the sky,
the line between their eyes never breaking.
The melody of the slow, sweet song
twisted and turned around itself,
our eyes all on them:
Mustafa, tender and sweet,
Kaban and Papa proud,
Misak and Kevorg dreaming.
Mothers blushed.
Children shushed.
Sounds of the stream
on the stone
and the wood
filled the air,
till Papa rose to stand,
his hand across his heart.
“My wife’s brother is a faraway fool
to hold back his blessing for Anahid and Asan.
Here it is clear. You men are my brothers.
Our holy books differ by one prophet only.
“The sun does not shine
on one man and his family
keeping others in the dark,
even in New York.”
When falcons or hawks came to my nest,
I must confess, I sang a different song.

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