17 February 2013
Chapter 2
The only attempt at a beginning which I can pinpoint was in 1926. I was a boy of five, living through a time in life when I felt I was on the cusp of something marvellous but a something which my feeble young mind could not manage to fathom nor explain. The world was a new and wide and marvellous place which was open for exploration and I would explore it for all I was worth. Schwernheim's gardens where just the start. Next it would be the fjords of Norway, the gateway to the frozen palaces of the Arctic where Odin and Frigga would smile down on me through the graceful dance of the Aurora. Then the rainforests of South America where I would hack my way through a buzzing, vibrant flame of foliage, full of all marvellous types of creatures smouldering in glossy, humid motion along the banks of the Amazon. Or perhaps India to see the luxury of a rajah's court or even a junk ride through the magnificent Orient to some long lost dynasty's golden shrine. For now the ants crawling through clogged, clay earth where my majestic Bengal tigers and polar bears but one day I would see a real one and bring it back home. It was precisely this activity, this obsession with the unknown which led to my acquaintance with Frau Hoffmann. Ah was a withered old soul who preferred to be alone and only spoke to those whom she deemed worthy on rare occasions. It was said she could hold entire conversations in her head, a cranial tea-party with herself as hostess and many other Frau Hoffmann's as the guests. She might well have out her disposition to good use as she would have made and excellently comical ventriloquist such was her dry wit and seemingly innate ability to communicate without so much as a whisper, and I do not doubt that at one point she must have been one in her mind. But she was a seethingly sharp old blade, as bitter and unforgiving a the invisible lemon upon which she perpetually sucked. For a young boy, the reaction is mostly one of dumbfounded stupor. 'Get off your knees you filthy thing, you'll have those trousers ruined! I shudder to think of how much darning your poor mother must have to do of an evening, you insolent little brat. Ungrateful and inconsiderate, that's what you are, you hateful little maggot. God damns hateful children, boy, just you remember that when you say your prayers at night. You do say your prayers, don't you boy? Speak up; speak when you are spoken to!' Before I could react to her demands a change came over her with a blink of those ice cold eyes, one always looking at you in scorn and the other searching deep within you for your sins. This weathered Frau spoke again, baptised anew through some strange trick if a light which can only shine through the prism of the soul, showing off each glistening element in turn. 'Don't listen to her boy,' she seemed to whisper and wink, leaving one uncertain as to whether the words were coming from her mouth or her stare. 'Get away boy, quick as you can now and try not to bother her again. She always picks and pokes at the joy of the heart, like some cruel vulture clawing at something not quite dead. A vile old hag boy, a miserable cretin, mark my words. Away with you.' 'Stay right where you are, you little maverick or I'll have the wolves do away with you. I can speak to them you know, I have them at my beck and call and they'll toy with you until you're nothing but a scrap then tear you to pieces half alive. And you,' she barked, her eyes glossing over, seeing a life on some other side. 'Don't you talk about me like that ever again. I can hear you, you old wench.' 'Well no-one knows you better than yourself and I can see how rotten and black and hideous a heart you really have. You can fool others with your silence but you can't hide from yourself. You sick away at all manner of goodness that surrounds you and you can't take it when I call a spade a spade.' 'Once again the pot calls the kettle black, my loathsome dear. So good and virtuous when you forget that everyone deserted you, they all left you on your lonesome. There's two sides to a coin and I am the head to your tail, I am the only one who has stood by you.' 'They didn't desert us, you pushed then away.' 'Pushed them?' She spat, the venom lacing her words so caustic that they burnt the lips which birthed them. 'I did not push, I'm afraid you are so sadly mistaken in your denial.' 'Heinrich and Wilhelm and Bruno and Jana...' 'Alone and alone and alone once again, without so much as a kiss to guide you along. Poor helpless creature, so alone in her pain, so unloved and starved of a human touch. They never understood...' 'Kieselguhr and Anna and Trudy and Yannik...' 'Burning in your solitude...' 'Eva and Yoken and Klaus...' 'When will it stop...' Heinrich and Wilhelm and Bruno and Jana...' 'Stop burning...' 'Liesel and Anna and Trudy and Yannik...' 'Stop...' 'Eva and Yoken and Klaus 'Stop it...' 'Heinrich and Wilhelm and Bruno and Jana...' 'Stop it...' 'Liesel and Anna and Trudy and Yannik...' 'I said stop it...' She growled at her demons both dark and light, gripping fistfuls of wiry grey hair on her scalp. 'Eva and Yoken and Klaus and Heinrich and Wilhelm and Bruno and Jana and...' 'Stop stop stop...' The roll call became louder and ever frantic, swirling around in the sky punctuated by desperate, authorities pleas for respite from the nightmares they conjured out of the airy bliss of the soft Alpine breeze. Wisps of grey snow from her tormented head flew off to join their siblings on the mountain tops, the blizzard getting heavier. Until it stopped. Stopped howling and instead crooned gently, a tear sliding down the Ice Queen's cheek as she thawed. 'Guten Abend, gute Nacht, mit Rosen bedacht, mit Näglein besteckt, schlupf' unter die Deck.' 'I do say my prayers.' I offered feebly to the crag of rock now sat before me. But as to many others, she offered nothing in reply.
Dialogue And The Doppler Effect • Opuss № I