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W. H. Pugmire
In Memoriam: Tod William Streater
"Blossoming and withering we comprehend as one."
- Rilke
The ashen angel wept into the pool of squalid water.
"There," the woman whispered, pointing to the center of the pool. "You see, the cluster of flowers that float before the statue?" I hesitated, not knowing what to say. Sensing my fear, she took my hand in hers. "No, no, my dear. Don't be afraid. The water knows that you are here on a mission of merciful love for your brother. It will hold you above its depths."
This weird information did little to calm my nerves. This mountain pool, this odd valley, and Maria herself all seemed all figures from some disturbing dream. I was afraid.
I looked into the water. Vague, murky figures, like shadows of ghosts, seemed to drift just below the surface. Maria sat her rump upon the mountain floor. She swayed slowly to and fro, her squat hands raised above the water. She sang. A faint zephyr swept across the water, pushed into our faces. A sweetly sour redolence lingered in the air.
The woman sighed. A wistful smile played upon her lips as she watched the streams of water fall from the statue's sculptured eyes. "Now. You must swim to where the flowers float beneath the statue. As you enter the water you must sense in your soul the love you feel for Thomas. You must focus on your resolution to assist him, no matter the sacrifice."
"And what is that sacrifice to be?"
She looked upon the water for one silent moment. "I cannot say."
I closed my eyes, saw within my mind an image of my brother on his deathbed. He was surrounded by candlelight and blossom. I watched the movement of his lips as he quietly begged that I help him die. I beheld upon his skin the lesions that he attempted to hide with his heavy robe. Dull anger and exquisite heartache filled my eyes with water. I wept into the turbid pool.
Windsong echoed softly at my ears. I raised my weary eyelids and peered into the pool. Its water had cleared just where my tears had dropped. My hazy reflection beckoned me to walk into the water. Sighing, I turned to look at my companion; but I was alone. She who had led me to this enchanted mountain pool had left me to my lonely fate. With trembling hands I removed my clothes. Naked, I knelt before the pool and prayed to whatever god may have had the grace to listen.
I crawled into the water. It was thick, and as warm as newly-shed blood. Yet how my flesh chilled at its touch! Uncanny sensations swam within my being.
I pushed myself deeper into the filmy depths. Ripples surged away from me, then returned like a hungry thing. I splashed, but there was no noise. In panic I raised my arms and kicked my legs. The water that covered my arms seeped into my tingling flesh. Not one drop returned into the pool.
Without any attempt of my own I drifted toward the angelic statue. Its sad visage watched my dilatory approach. I stopped just before the clump of dry flowers. They were dull dead things. I did not want to touch them. Suddenly, horribly, the nearest flower began to lift itself and float toward me. As if in dream, I lowered my hand into the water. The flower sailed into my grasp.
I raised the flower to my face. Its desiccated substance felt horrid in my hand. Repulsed, I tightened my fingers so to crush the lifeless floret. I gasped as pain shot through my hand. I had embraced an unseen thorn. But this was no rose! I had never seen its like.
My scarlet dew dropped into the water. The surrounding surface shimmered, cleared. I beheld within its body the nude reflections of women and men. They swam blissfully about the mirrored image of the statue. That stony angel smiled upon them as it ran its fingers through their flowing hair. It turned its chiseled countenance and gazed with adoration at the reflection of my startled face. It leaned to kiss the image of my lips.
Numb vibration spilled into my face, flowed throughout my being. Vision beclouded. Senses transformed. I felt as weightless as a whispered word.
Mountain floor pressed against my limbs. I picked myself up from the stony surface. I was as absolutely dry as the thing I grasped in my aching hand. Tipping slightly forward I gazed into the haunted pool. My forlorn reflection floated for a moment just beneath the water's surface. Its hands were empty. Other hands, indistinct and ghostly, wrapped around its ankles. It sank forever into the tenebrous depths.
II.
An angel sang to me in dream. It sang with voices that issued from twin mouths. Black leather wings spread over its twin bodies. I gazed at where those naked forms were joined at the waist.
The air rushed furiously about me, blessed with heavy movement from the wind of wings. Wings that beat the air in rhythm to an angel's ancient song.
My quivering mouth opened. I graced the swirling air with song. I sang for centuries, accompanied by the creature joined at my side. His hand embraced my breast, just above my heartbeat. His moist lips pressed against my face, my mouth. His curling tongue slipped into the depths of my soul.
My phallus stretched toward the sky. It was a thorny vine upon which a dewy blossom glistened at its tip. I ripped it from me and gave it to my love. He brought it to his face, sucked with famished lips its nectar. With a single thrust, he slashed its silver thorns across the flesh that made us one. Heaven was stained with flowing blood. Waves of thick crimson washed my brother from my view.
Sobbing, I awakened. Beside my pillow sat the small velvet casket that contained the arcane flower. I ran my fingers across the velvet, remembering the softness of my brother's hair. I heard once more the plea that had brought me to this valley.
"Help me, Jeremy. Help me die."
Oh, the agony of those words. The plague had eaten his youthful vitality. Months of illness had withered him into a pallid memory of what he once had been.
"Help me die, brother. I know a way."
In violence I threw the bedclothes from me. Finding matched, I lit a circle of candles that sat upon the floor. Within that circle of golden light I knelt to pray. But how could I pray, to whom? Not to a god that could allow my brother to die such a ungodly death.
I gazed through the nearby window, into night. The tremendous mountain towered before me. Its twin peaks of white stone seemed to drink starlight. They sparkled in darkness.
Breathing hard, I prayed to the titanic mountain. Somewhere in the valley creatures cried to moonlight. My mind calmed. Opening my eyes, I gazed at the window's glass. The room wherein I knelt was reflected on its surface.
I looked, and felt my flesh grow cold. I saw the room, the flickering candles that surrounded me. I saw this only. There was no image of myself.
I understood my sacrifice.
III.
What stays with me now is the memory of silence that existed on that magic mountain, beside its haunted pool. That is the memory that somehow soothes my brain and contains my sorrow.
The other memories, the painful ones, fade as life grows old. I remember entering his room upon my return. I remember the scent of countless flowers that crowded every corner of his chamber. I recall frowning at the fragrance of magnolia incense, the smoke of which caused him to cough violently at times.
He had interpreted my frown, and smiled in delighted guilt. We gazed at one another in heavy silence. I knew within all that he wished expressed. We shared a common intuition, words not always required. This inner comprehension had, in youth, been a wonderful game for us, a language of smiles and glances. But now I trembled, sick and terrified, at the silent revelations that sneered beneath his smile.
His brilliant eyes, how they glowed! His face and frame had altered horribly, aging him beyond our youth. But the eyes were as magnificent as they had always been, and therein lived the brother I had loved.
Yet even they had been tainted, though not by his illness. In youth we had played a game wherein we would stare into each other's eyes, so to catch our identical reflections. The memory of that game chilled my blood. I knew what I would not see had I gazed into those eyes for all eternity.
He seemed to sense my stress, and thus I turned to look about the room, upon one wall, where once had hanged a huge mirror, was a framed painting of the Christ. The Hebrew's face seemed worn with weariness. His large hands stretched long fingers toward the bleeding sacred heart. "As if to fondle it," Thomas had told me when we had found the painting in an old shop. "The Immaculate Masturbator," he had laughed. We had hanged the picture at a slight tilt and surrounded it with plaster cherubim. Looking at it cheered me now, and glancing at my brother we shared a melancholy smile.
"Admiring my portrait, brother dear?" He whispered. "How sad that we'll soon have to, um, update it so to speak; perhaps with a bouquet of bones."
"Don't be morbid," I moaned.
"Excuse me, child, but I will. Morbidity is the song of my condition. I'll sing it till the grim majesty of Death stops my mouth forever."
"You remind me of a very bad actor who did a sad impersonation of Wilde when you talk like that."
"Ah, poor Oscar. He knew this tune of dying very well. But had you too been a poet you would know that the song is an old one. I've always felt Death's hungry little mouth nipping at my heels. This queer disease, that eats my life away, teaches nothing that I've not already known."
"God what boring chat," I cried impatiently, flinging myself into a nearby chair.
"You are exhausted, poor thing. But, pray, what is that thing of velvet that nestles in your lap?"
"You know very well what it is. Maria sends her love."
"Charming woman."
"I found her odd. I found the entire thing too weird." Something in my distress seemed to amuse him, for suddenly he laughed; then violently coughed. "This damn incense," I shouted angrily, reaching for the nearby flask of imported French spring water, spilling some into the silver goblet that he adored. Our hands touched as he took the goblet from me. I had to fight the instinct to look at his. He stared into my face, frowning as he drank. Overwhelmed with guilty sorrow, the water welled within my eyes.
"Don't," he rasped, setting down the goblet. "Your pitiful sorrow is such a bore. Now, hand me the bloom of alchemy."
I opened the casket. The dry dead flower was wrapped in soft white silk. I took it from the tiny casket and gave it to my brother.
"Yes, yes," he whispered, slipping the silk away. "This will ease me toward a blessed rest."
"And leave me all alone on this pathetic planet," I grumbled.
"You'll follow in time, my child."
"Sooner than you think, perhaps."
He gazed at me with narrow eyes. "That I forbid!"
"Oh, but it's okay for you to take your life," I argued, suddenly plunged into the depths of self-pity, all the while feeling frightened and ashamed.
"Don't dare to compare our situation," he said in a calm low voice. "We are not alike in this. We have altered absolutely. I'll soon be naught but memory, a faded photograph behind an oval of dusty glass. And you'll be singing in sunlight, an edition of Rimbaud in your sweaty hand."
"You'll be the stuff of poetry and song. I'll sit upon dull dirt and watch worms at play."
"Which reminds me: I wish to be buried among the worms of Sesqua Valley. I've left instructions, and a note to be sent Maria. She'll understand, and help you. Don't frown so. These are my wishes. Now."
Fear welled up within me, but I could neither move nor speak. He shifted from his sitting position, reclining fullly on the bed. Two mauve pillows supported his back and head. Their ends protruded from beneath his shoulders, like soft squat wings.
Motionless, I watched him open his heavy robe. He placed the flower upon his chest. "Goodbye," he whispered.
The atmosphere grew heavy. Floral perfume wafted about us. Light thickened and dulled. Oppressed with sudden dizziness, I fell to my knees just before his bed.
His rasping breath softened and grew still. The horrid lines of age and illness smoothed upon his flesh. The brittle flower, too, began to alter, grew moist and fresh and lovely. There came from its blossom a beautiful aroma. I gulped the waves of heady fragrance. They seeped into my face, my very being. They floated near my heart. I felt that organ's thud inside my ears and in my brain.
And his. I felt his heartbeat join mine, a brotherly palpitation. I watched his flesh as it seemed to drink the flower's substance. I watched the flower melt, joining his flesh. I saw that flesh transform, soften and pale. Reaching out, I touched his skin, his hair. My hand found the place above his heart whereon he placed the magick bloom. I could not take my hand away. And thus I felt it, that which seemed to subtly shake the universe.
His final heartbeat.
Copyright © 1997 Peter A. Worthy
"The Bloom of Sacrifice" © 1997 by W. H. Pugmire
