That House on the Hill

I want the warmth of hearth and home. It is natural.

The house that draws my heart and mind away from all reasonable and natural desire, however, is desolate of any ember that might be kindled into a passionate flame. From yet so far a distance my imagination conjures up interior walls blackened by the oily soot of poorly trimmed kerosene lamps and a dank, poorly drafted fireplace whose tepid fires never quite took. The windows, likewise, are years and years gone unwashed. The now opaque panes distort through their dried-on grime views from within, visions from without. Paneled ceilings, somber and bleak, drip decades-worth of filthy webs downward toward stalagmite accumulations of swirling debris that reach upward, grasping tentatively, from warped and gaping oaken planks.

A grand and spiraling staircase takes center stage but startles me as its wide and toothless grin reflects the loss of many a baluster. It dares me any further approach. I draw back instinctively yet am morbidly fascinated by what is gently swaying in shadow ...

In the dark, at the top of the stairs....


My arrest of attention upon movement upstairs was abruptly diverted by the slamming shut of the huge entry door, that accomplished with a huge sucking sound and consequent evacuation of a heavy, fetid atmosphere. More unsettled by my own annoyance at the rude interruption of the unfolding of delicious terror than I was by actual fright, I spun round and stopped dead, face-to-face with a most unexpected sight ...


What could have been only a hasty delivery by an unseen courier - so much of my account seems fraught with the unknowable, the invisible - was my scarcely determined assessment of a large wooden container's sudden arrival, landed squarely at the entrance. I saw the downward, lazy swirl of dust coming to rest whence it came, having been excited and cast upward from the box's crash to the floor's thick cushion of dust. My approach toward the mysterious carton was, needless to say, accomplished with the utmost caution, and not a little trepidation as my thoughts cast backward to the tale of Pandora. However dim the light stealing through the long unwashed glass proved to be, I was, nevertheless, able to read the name of the addressee ... Elizabeth Vincent, my long-departed mother. Any vestige of fear clutching at my heart gave way to an insatiable curiosity to discover what ill lay in wait for me from within the steep, rectangular walls of pine. In my mother's stead, I deemed it entirely suitable to take possession of her property.

Locating a crowbar amongst a heap of tools and diverse household paraphernalia in the kitchen, I hastened back to the box and began unfastening the several nails holding the broad lid in place. After a number of unsuccessful attempts to slide the tapered, flat end of the bar between the tight seam between cover and box, I finally penetrated the seeming hermetic seal that, ironically, appeared to wish absolute denial of entry therein. The usual loud and protracted squawk of nails letting go their tenacious hold on wood did not disappoint for all its raucous clamor.

I worked my way around the box - some nine-foot-square was the lid - and at last had released each nail's fast hold to the box proper and set to pull off and lower the lid to the floor. Though I had figured the box to be pine for its light coloring and presence of characteristic knots, yet the top was exceedingly heavy. I managed it down by tugging at one corner, drawing it bit-by-bit toward me, then, likewise, the opposing end.

As I let out a sigh of relief over the unusual expenditure of time and effort, I let the lid drop, barely missing my feet.


Astonished, incredulous, aroused emotionally.

Words, even when taken to the superlative level by that four letter word, cannot adequately describe my trembling, choked-by-sobs self. The capacious container was resting place to a multitude of books that had been lovingly and carefully arranged in a deep cushion of excelsior. Though this bevy of books had the evident look of relative antiquity about them, there was not the characteristic odor of must and damp so prevalent among cemeteries of long-forgotten books.

I reached with the utmost reverence for the volume that had caught my attention and won my affection as a mere lad: Arundel, by Kenneth Roberts. Knowing nothing then about the historicity of the American colonies' various accounts (some, I have since learned, are disputed as to accuracy), I was taken by N.C. Wyeth's cover art of Indians and settlers canoeing the swelling waters of the Dead River ... the Arundel River ... the Kennebec ... la Riviere du Loup? I cannot recall, but the deep blue waters tipped by creamy white caps, the crisp, colorful off-shore autumn foliage, the looming, inscrutable blue hill, have long since inhabited my imagination.

Once out of my memory-stirred reverie, I began slowly turning pages, traveling digitally the maps depicting the moves of Colonel Benedict Arnold and his men, the Prologue by Steven Nason (the story's protagonist). On page ten I caught sight of Steven's loving tribute to his mother, Sarah. Why my careful though somewhat random perusal took in that particular account, I've no clue - there was simply too much to take in, given my excitement and agitated sense of deja-vu. Nevertheless, the words were fitting, as I could have said the same about Elizabeth Vincent, my mother.

Steven thanked God for his mother's education ...


She read Shakespeare and Plato; in addition, she spoke French, some of which she passed on to her son, and that of no little benefit to him. Apparently Sarah Nason, nee Butler, wished her son to ponder matters other than the merely mundane: fish, weather, sleep. Regarding the outlay of funds for educational purposes in their district of Arundel, the citizenry were wont to decry the prodigal expenditure of fifty pounds a year. I have reason to believe that Steven rose above the loutishness of his neighbors, though he did not consider himself a man well versed in letters.

In like manner, with regard to the above comments relative to parents' mentorship of their malleable offspring, my siblings and I were encased, as it were, with books of every description. Whether the virtual overflow of every sort of reading matter in our cluttered bungalow had been principally for Elizabeth's personal enjoyment and, collaterally, that of us children, I do not know for certain my mother's prime motivation. Surely, she encouraged and promoted our literary travels by leading her enthusiastic bookworms each week to the ancient Carnegie Library of stone and ivy. I cried when the city tore down the venerable edifice where adventure and learning had come together and borne me. The replacement contained the same books of paper, spines and hardback covers, but the former atmosphere (one of enlightened decay) among the stacks was missing. The sanitized air of the new building did not sit well with me. I was just a kid; I didn't know why.

Somehow this dirty old house, whose true character I'm still not certain of, is in concert, silently so, with Elizabeth Vincent's container of books.

I must dig in further.

The Darkened Pane

My frequent walks these last few years about the neighborhood so familiar to me would ordinarily be construed a pleasant enough non-event. A little mild exercise - taken in small doses to keep the joints operating properly - and a keen eye peeled for the ever-changing face of nature have rendered the daily promenade a suitable diversion. Until recently.
 
I noticed nothing unusual at the beginning; I saunter over the same roads almost without variation, being an inveterate creature of habit. To tell the truth, I cannot pinpoint the exact day I began walking in this particular region of my town, other than the fact that, when I moved here some three years ago, I was too involved with matters more pressing than finding time to exercise. Nevertheless, once in a routine of regular jaunts throughout our peaceful suburb, I really sensed nothing out of the ordinary. No, not until recently.
 
I'm being stalked. Not in the usual sense. No crazed individual lurks in shadow. No person trails me surreptitiously. The sun is shining and birds are singing. Evil does not happen under such circumstances. Yet, an evil far more sinister than any miserable human could embody and visit upon the unwary soul has seeped into my neighborhood. Slowly. Insidiously. By otherworldly design.
 
The beauty of my natural surroundings - wherever that might happen to be - has never failed to tug at my heart and stir my imagination. For a certainty there are enchanted castles in the clouds, armies of fabulous creatures inhabiting the forest and crusty woodsmen rafting down a river swollen by heavy, unseasonal rain.  A secluded cabin properly placed in this setting would be the perfect touch. Back to the present: I am capable of distinguishing between reality and imagination, however active and fertile that imagination may be.
 
It's impossible to take in one's surroundings all at once. In addition to observing nature, I revel in the diverse architecture of my neighborhood. Even over a period of time, however, one still misses detail. Yes, there always has been a house on that lot, but I hadn't noticed the awnings over the two windows facing the street. Oh, this home on Robin Way has a brass kick plate affixed to the base of the front door. Was it always there? When did the Johnston's install metal railing on their deck? I didn't notice that the wooden corral railing had been removed ...
 
And there it was. Why hadn't I seen it before? I've shot a look at that hillside more times than I can count, but I don't remember ever seeing that house on the hill before. It gives all the appearance of rising up from the soil as though it were sown and nurtured there, tended as though it were part and parcel of the wood itself. This acknowledgement of a hillside dwelling should not, of itself, be any cause for undue concern. Of course not. Not till somewhat later, feeling a slight need for change and taking a different stretch of road, did I look out toward another band of foothills and feel a shudder fly up my spine.
 
There, unmistakable, was the house. I looked and looked again. It couldn't be. I've walked so long, so far. Nothing else about the forested ridge appeared remotely familiar. I was taken aback by the ghostly deadness of the land and forest surrounding the building. As for the defining architecture, the line of the house, the slant of the roof and ... the window.... What was clearly recognizable as a window was not by any means a typical pane of glass. Despite the other readily identifiable characteristics of the house, the window was, eerily so, the distinguishing feature.

 

Darkly sinister. And peering ...

 

Peering at me....
 
 

This Is Not My Home

 

I awake in a place that clearly is not home.

 

Looking about in a blurry daze, the expected trappings of bed, chair and scuffed, dirty walls have somehow disappeared during my wretched slumber. All the familiar has slid away, swirling downward, but not swallowed, into an eerily black vortex above which my stiffened body floats unaffected by the devouring maelstrom. My immediate surroundings are an atmosphere of greenish hue that is part of what appears to be sky. Not a sky like I've ever seen before. Definitely a sky. Emerald and iridescent. Suspended amidst the shimmering splendor of undulating waves of a surreal firmament is a golden sphere, which I take to be a moon. The gentle but steady rays of illumination it sends forth warm me. This I find puzzling, as this celestial body is not a star.

 

I continue to have no control over my body, yet I am not uncomfortable nor do I sense any imminent danger. Something has changed regarding the direction put upon me. A force - like what I would imagine to be a tractor beam - draws me upward and away from the strangely silent but malevolent whirlpool below. Coming into focus at a distance seemingly close, but probably an infinite space away in light years, is an incredible edifice of glass, porcelain and adamantine steel - a veritable temple of a night's vision, dedicated to some constellation's god. Opalescent double doors of extraordinary height and hung upon hinges of gold begin to open in protracted slow motion. Blazing through the widening expanse of the closed-become-revealed is a brilliance like that of Earth's noonday sun. I gaze directly upon its supernal glory; in the manner of a dream, I am unharmed.

 

I startle as there emerges from doors now fully opened the likes of which nightmares are made ...

La Luna

Chilled to the bone, I couldn't care less.

Awakened by an otherworldly light flowing languidly through a single pane of glass, I arise from crumpled sheets and pad my way over to the frosty view that patiently awaits me. Full, round and gleaming is beauty supernal: my exquisite, my lovely Moon. I wish to touch her but am overwhelmed by giant sentinels whose barren arms are reaching longingly for her. For all their height, those statuesque trees are no more able to touch her silvery face than I. The eternal, desperate pining for what is enthroned on high.

I do truly adore La Luna. The commute, however, should prove impossible.

So Green Is My Valley

So green is my valley, become verdant after our first heavy autumn rain. I hadn't really noticed as passage through our expansive low plain is generally accomplished by automobile, bus or bicycle. Always in a hurry to get from here to there, I missed how the scorch of an eternal summer was transforming from regulation California brown into shimmering emerald. My blinders, however, have been removed. Deprived recently of a vehicle, and only rarely boarding the county bus, I decided to hoof my way over the county thoroughfare in order to see what I had been missing while keeping my eyes on the road and hands on the wheel.

Tuesday morning was crisp and cool but promised to warm quickly the pavement I trod and the air I gulped down. At mile 2.2 from home, the valley floor opened before me as clusters of oak vying for room and attention with cedar and pine acceded to the inexorable onslaught of an immense, sweeping table of flatness. Rising valiantly through the detritus of spent spring grasses was new, dewy pasture, carpeting untold acres of grazing land in green for at least another 7 months. In a bluish haze, embracing the valley but with distinct aloofness, appeared the upward sloping terrain, its turning gradually into our renowned foothills, now decked out in full autumn dress.

I had to stop and drink it all in. However polluted with noise the atmosphere became and remained from the infernal, internal combustion of early morning commuters' SUVs, pickup trucks, luxury sedans and sport coupes, I was totally oblivious. There was a ten second interval - it might have been fifteen - when I actually tuned into bird song. Otherwise, I was hooked on the view that I had somehow missed while driving the road day in, day out.

I don't envy my neighbors their fancy cars, just their fancy walking shoes.

Boy, are my dogs barkin'!

Damp. Dark. Somber.

 

Damp. Dark. Somber.

 

That is today's moody weather and I embrace it. Saying good-bye to an over-hot summer was a fait accompli. Crackling days and azure skies are suitable for some obscure reason - I just arrived on the universal scene a whisper ago - yet I would just as soon find my infinite pleasure in a state of repose at the hearth, books aplenty at the ready for cracking and wandering through. In search of adventure.

 

Perhaps in search of nothing.

Beauty Rises From the Ashes

An artist peers into the rubble of death and decay and glimpses what one less inured to such travesty cannot. He sees form, even intricate structure of great complexity, and ultimately, a singular, transcending beauty. This believer in what is not easily read by most senses that, in the swirl of visual chaos and stench of life's loss, renewed life will assuredly come to birth. With or without the mere mortal's attendance upon life's reemergence from the grave, this process is an unending cycle: life, death, renewal. The destruction of the painter's canvas, the writer's essay, or the composer's manuscript is not an untenable blow to the creator's genius. Whether the ensuing conflagration is by literal fire or that of a public's outrage over a body of work ahead of its time, the perceptive artist knows that the phoenix will arise resplendent from the ashes. Her song shall be heard. The hidden masterwork moldering away in a cemetery of a cellar long forgotten will be rediscovered, recopied and premiered before a humbled and contrite audience. The artist, now freed from earthly care and turmoil, observes among a once disbelieving public what he never ceased believing:

Beauty shines forth where the eyes of others have yet to fall. Beauty sings forth what their ears have yet to hear.

Isle of the Dead

 

Do not expect my imminent return, Dearest Isola.
 
Matters of a most urgent and grave nature have torn me ... from the home that I love ... from those dear humans whose cherished society I commenced missing within moments of my sighting of Charon.

 

The inevitable had arrived sooner than I might have ever imagined. Robust health, love of life, piety toward God ... these three provide no defense against destiny nor release from the dismal glide over Acheron. Yet, in a most unexpected and singular fashion, I sense that I have become a man to the utmost degree. The irrational fears that plagued my entire, pitiful life have released what I knew to be never anything less than an iron, viselike grip. It is true that I am scarcely at liberty to overturn fate's request to accompany her to my newest and perhaps not so dreaded domicile. I am, however, free to accept joyfully - as a man possessing the courage of his forebears - that I shall reside for eternity on the Isle.
 
Row, Charon, row. Lead me unto my awaited estate ...

 

I Climb the Walls

 

My dear wife Marie:

 

My surroundings are Nature at her most beautiful. How am I able to enjoy all this glory with you not here at my side? I wish you would change your mind and come join me before I climb the walls. Were I a younger and more able man I would jump the guards and clamber over the cheval-de-frise just to escape this hell hole. Did you and the girls put me here because of my numerous sins of commission, or were the ones of omission far graver? I have witnesses and tears to the effect that I endeavored to make good all my mistakes. I never meant to hurt you or Jason. I told you already how beautiful the grounds are. Well, sumptuous beauty - yours, Nature's, our daughters', Jason's - are all mischievous and cruel triggers. A rare moment when my heart and mind find their ease, a mere and momentary escape from my all burdens, and, with no warning - SLAM! My tranquility evaporates as in the blazing heat of an August scorcher. Any tiny hope of redemption is forever quashed. When, Marie, are you coming to see me? The inmates here are pleasant enough, but I have a sneaking suspicion it's the Thorazine.

 

I walked three miles today along the track that the administration has provided for my use. They say I'm a big shot so I get extra privileges. My walks - jogs, depending how my hips are working any given day - clear my mind and calm me. I saw four Monarchs at various points of my morning's path. At my approach each, in her turn, flitted off, no, not in fear, I'm certain, because you know my connection with all creatures great and small. It was a systematically choreographed but random ascent deliberately rehearsed in my honor ... for my escape. I know this is true because Herr Dressler told us at the congress that the flapping of the wings of a single butterfly can create a hurricane of inexorable destruction. So I recall. The forces of Nature - even the delicate agitation of a fragile Monarch's wings - are not to be mocked.

 

I must post this love letter to you, my darling Marie, before dark as le facteur will soon have finished his rounds.

 

All my love,

 

Henri

 

****************

 

Dear Sonja,

 

A quick note as I have to rush off to see Dad. Jason was so generous to allow Dad to stay indefinitely at his gorgeous estate. After all, they were best friends forever and there's nothing Jay wouldn't do for dear old Pops. He's becoming more and more disoriented, however. When Dad's at the garden table in his wheelchair, the aides tell me he taps, taps away at the table top for hours at a time, in the deepest, unbroken concentration. Should we dig out his old Olivetti portable?

 

I'm at a loss how we can ease Dad along since Mom died. Do you think he'll ever speak again?

 

Gotta run. I'll let you know how it goes. Oh, how I hate to see the most wonderful man in the world losing it!

 

Hugs,

 

Marte