One of my nieces used to cup her hands over the enchanting pictures in her storybooks, and carry them invisibly in a finger-cradle to her mother. At that time, my sister-in-law washed dishes by ones and twos in a portable tub, hung laundry to dry, and revolved a simple routine of feeding, delighting, neatening and […]
The Endless Steppe, by Esther Hautzig
“The morning it happened — the end of my lovely world — I did not water the lilac bush outside my father’s study.” The lilt of Esther Hautzig’s memory of exile in Siberia–seared by privation, filth, and loss–keeps an almost magical, storybook intonation. Her cadences are soothing, even when her recollections are barbed. The World […]
Walking With Aslan
Walking With Aslan If I could go, my small hand hidden in your tangled flame, feeling strength flow through a massive frame, seeing bright tremor shaken from Light’s face ’til shapes around you glow — then would it matter, any place I went with you? What things the sparks of glory flew from you to […]
Sunny and Eve – part three
Read first: Sunny and Eve – part one Sunny and Eve – part two My dear Sunny, Will’s letter began. I haven’t written in a while. This occupation makes me feel unfit to write to you, though I think of you constantly. I am writing now because I have bad news. I dread to write […]
Sunny and Eve – part two
Read first: Sunny and Eve – part one “S’that yer daughter, Jakob?” someone asked. Eve stood a little tremulously in her solidly soled shoes on a street spread with awnings and carpets, jumbled with multi-colored, many textured, differingly dense and angled objects. Around these, the street was confused with motion and cries. Her father had […]