If All Else Fails by Craig Strete Read Free Book Online Page A

across his face in a wing-and-feather mo­tion, shielding his eyes from the sharp face of the sun.
Softly like a bird he moved, like a bird about to soar. He said, "I will fascinate you. I will
tear out your eyes with spirit teeth."
    And he laughed and
laughed.
    And below him, the
city sat on its buildings.
    And he laughed and
laughed.
    And Detroit
screamed on its wheels.
    And Chicago slid on
slaughtered animals.
    And the old man
sucked it up in his breath. The panic of an animal city was like telltale smoke to an
owl.
    And Los Angeles
waited like a pregnancy in unmoving traffic.
    And the skyline of
New York, for the first time, did not cast any shadows.
    And the old man
tore it away like cobwebs and laughed and laughed.
    And the closed eyes
of animals, with their heads to the ground, moved slowly with flies.
    And the old man saw
it. He saw the city burning. The concrete, the steel, the brick and iron, all burning. And the
wood of dead trees was rusting. And he laughed, sharpening claws he never had. And there was a
song, a little song from his memory and it too was burning.
    And the song said,
"Go to sleep and do not cry. Your mother is dead and still you feed upon her breasts." That is
what the song said. It was the end-of-the-world song of a hungry spider who spins his last web,
knowing how to die.
    Back there on the
hill, the old man's song got cold waiting for him. And the people set all the dances on fire. All
the dances on fire. And they packed them away still burning, with handfuls of dirt, red earth
like pipestone. They gave the dances all burning to mother earth. Only mother earth can keep
dances when the world ends.
    The old man stood
in the harsh glare of the city, wrapped in the soft protection of folded wings of memory. The air
around him was alive with flame as his memories got stronger and the earth moved beneath him with
the power of living before him and after him. He felt the earth moving under his feet like a
child spinning around and around in a secret place known only to boys. Tomorrow was cold and
burnt away to ash. But in the secret place that lived yet in­side of him, the current was slow
and the warm brown river seemed to be standing still.
    And the reason that
had sent him away from the hill, when the people gathered, came up the brown river and he could
not say her name. No, he could not say her name. Not even now when the world ends could he say
her name. For the dead take their names with them out of the world.
    But he thought of
her in this time of the coming back, in this time of the world ending and coming out of the
ground. His old woman had not come out of the ground. That was why he was there. That was why he was there to see the city sitting
on its buildings.
    There to see the
city that had hidden the sky. The other people had buried their city on her grave.
    He listened. He did
not hear the scratching of her fingers as she clawed at the city above her. Or did he? Was the
long animal cry of the city her cry, too? Was it her moving-in-the-grave sound?
    The ears of an owl
are sharp and he listened. And then he knew he heard her. The owl can hear many things when the
world ends, and he heard her. The scratching, the painful scratching of her moving.
    "She cannot come up
through the sidewalk concrete," he said. That is what he said. And in his face he took her
ham­mer and beat her name into ashes and beat those ashes into a hammer. But the spirit calling
of her to come was not enough. They had buried a city on her grave.
    He closed his eyes
and he said, "I will wait and watch. I will not go down there yet. I will not speak and see if
they do not move the city. They do not need the city anymore. Maybe they will tear it down
now."
    He was an owl and
that is what he said.
    But they did not
move the city. He waited and watched. An owl waited and watched but they did not move the city.
The other people had buried their city. It was behind them even