There once was a bird
who never was heard
but always had something to say.
Up in the clouds, she flew higher
than the rest
and to the few who saw her,
she was regarded as the best.
Her feathers were dark
a sad little lark,
She was an instrument no one could play.

One day as she flew high above
the Sound,
she noticed the others as they were playing around
They reverberated from the ground,
those bright melodies below
and up up up
those puffy white notes did go.
She looked to the sky
and began to cry
at the love that resounded from where the flowers did grow.

So this little lark,
she cut off her wings
and rested happily on the grass
hoping and praying that gravity would allow
these terrible feelings to pass.
Never again would the bird have to
look down,
never again would she have to frown,
and love, for the bird,
would be a warm and fluttery sound.

But watching others take flight
soaring above and discovering her secret heights
was much harder than she knew.
Gravity was a prison
to this petite wingless pigeon
and this little bird knew
what she must do.

Later that evening, while the birds were in flight
a most beautiful melody bled softly
into the inky night.
And sure enough, a peculiar sound wave gained height:
a faint ripple with two dark wings
ever so slight.

A little chick looked to his ma:
"What's that sound coming from the bay?"

"Oh, that little lark," his ma did say,
"I always knew that she would fly away."

To this girl, there were few things more haranguing than the sound of laughter, especially when she wanted nothing more than to be alone. She may have been as busy as she liked, conjugating verbs, solving equations, writing music, and she may have been as far away as her synapses would allow, but soon enough, those shrill and staccato utterances would always seep through into even her tiniest cerebral crevices and infiltrate her most intimate hiding spaces. To her it was offensive (and even disturbing) to realize that she could never truly escape.

On longer days that left her feeling cold, she would turn to hot tea. She controlled every aspect of it: its taste and its heat and its scent, but she could never fully control its temperature. Yes, she could heat the water until it began to hiss, at which point she could turn off the boiler and force the kettle's sharp vaporous tongue to sink back into its dark and mysterious mouth, but she could not control how long its heat would remain. When she would drink her tea, the only things to enter her mind were its steamy and sinewy arms that beckoned her to indulge in momentary warmth and wholeness. Those soft and streaming limbs were always welcome in her very special vestibule, and for that she would almost always oblige to its requests. And for a moment, she didn't notice the wet and stinging laughter banging on her tin brow, and more importantly, she didn't feel so hollow or alone.

How ephemeral it all was. Soon enough, the laughter began to crack a hole in her cerebral ceiling, and the girl was soon presented with a rusting reminder of who she was and who she was not. She grew to be immensely jealous of the voices of others who seemed to be able to regulate their own body temperatures (at least in the company of others), jealous of the minds not susceptible to cracking or infiltration of dark and damp thoughts. The laughter came and went like the crashing of waves does at various points of the tide, and the girl began to imagine about what it was they were laughing.

She eventually began to notice that her fingers were beginning to pale, and decided to look to her cup for relief. Clasping the cup, she looked in. The girl's previous reflection, one barely discernible in that sultry, spiced mist was no longer; staring back at her was a sad and soggy teabag that had retreated away into a dark corner of its ceramic cave, ashamed and shuddering as she breathed slowly onto it.

The laughter grew, and the girl stared back into her cup and its bloated bottom feeder. It was there all along, lurking just below its steamy surface.

I am the joke.

The laughter then began to assume consonants and vowels, and despite its inevitable murkiness, the girl was able to decipher the things that she lacked. How silly of me to think that things never grow cold, and that suppression makes everything evaporate into the ether, leaving and taking with it nothing but a single breath. The laughter continued, and she felt hollow once more. Her brain was beginning to swell with those thoughts again.

The girl clasped her lavender hands around her cup even harder now, hoping for warmth to dry her thoughts and heat her hands, but she felt nothing. It would be impossible to do so, anyway; it was always vapor. A decrepit buoy floated helplessly in a shallow pool of brown water, simultaneously suffocating in and expelling its own filth. The girl took a finger to it, half-expecting the bag to hiss, to bite, to sting, but it didn't. It remained motionless; it was nothing, and it had always been nothing, even when it was something.

The laughter receded into the dark and silent deep. She had what she wanted! And the girl sat in a dry and quiet room clutching an empty cup. But she still could not escape.

turandot

There is a woman who stares at me each day, as I wake and as I fall. Her gaze is cold, distant, and made frozen and permanent by an antique frame. Her lips are pursed, and she appears somewhat choked from the glass that lays inextricable from her face. Beneath her indigo blouse reads her name: TURANDOT.


I never really was quite fond of opera, but I have always been a fan of the color indigo. Because I was moving into a new home, I wanted to fill my space with colors and textures that I liked. So one day while antiquing, I came across my frozen friend. She was hidden away behind some miserable 19th century landscape that romanticized the hunt. I was immediately captivated by the far away look in her eyes, the richness of her clothing, and her ornate jewelry. The attendant came to assist me.

"How much do you want for her?" I asked.

She seemed stunned. "For this?"

I nodded.

"Well let me even see, it's been here so long I've forgotten we've even had it." She mulled through the hunting paintings, searching (I'm assuming) for one of a similar size and with a similar frame for price comparison. "Are you sure you don't just want one of these, these are great landscapes."

I shook my head. "No, I really like this one. For whatever reason." I was a bit peeved that she seemed surprised at my interest. "Why, do you have something against this or something?"

She wiped the dust from her hands. "Well, no. I just think she looks evil. Those eyes, they are so distant, so cold. I'll charge you $75."

I took her.

I brought her upstairs to my new home, the first day of a new year and decade, and she fit beautifully by my bedside, and we became quick and close friends. However, her identity remained somewhat of a mystery to me. I decided to do some research.

From what I gathered, "Turandot" was the final work of the great Giacomo Puccini, and it was the tale of a princess (my framed friend) named Turandot. She was a beautiful girl and almost too clever for her own good. It soon grew time for her to choose someone to marry, and despite her good looks and choice of anyone in the lands, she wanted no men, and more than that, she wanted no one. To avoid having to make this decision, she would give any potential suitor three seemingly unsolvable riddles that they must answer. If they answered all three correctly, she would marry them. If they did not, they were to be beheaded. Suffice it to say, no one could solve the unsolvable and win Turandot's heart. Her mind was a crutch to avoid intimacy with others.

One day, however, a prince from a nearby land expressed interest in her. No one really knew his name. He was persistent (almost obnoxiously so), and would not leave until he could see Turandot and answer her riddles. She begrudgingly accepted, and began her questioning. The first question was as follows:

"What is born each night and dies each dawn?"

The prince answered, "Hope."

He was correct.

Coolly, Turandot posed the next question: "what flickers red and warm like a flame, yet is not fire?"

"Blood," the prince said.

He was correct again.

Slightly unnerved, the princess posed her final and most difficult question: "What is like ice, but burns like fire?"

The prince cried the correct answer immediately, "Turandot!"

She was disgusted. To be married? Let alone to an unknown? But he was relentless. Despite her unceasing requests for this stranger to go away at once and never return, he kissed her and held her in his arms. That initial contact, that human touch, was all Turandot needed. She was no longer imprisoned in her mind and no longer desired to be alone. She entered her father's throne, and introduced the name of her soon-to-be husband: "Love."

And it ended, and the two were wed. Happily Ever After.


However happy of a story that may be, it is important to note that Puccini died before finishing it. The final moments of that final act were not from his mind, but from another's. Another composer took on his vision, and intentionally or not, altered it (NB-it wasn't received well at all, the final act was called incredibly disjointed and an insult to Puccini's genius, and how sad it was that such a great would fade away with a second rate symphony). Beyond that, I somehow doubt that an old man on a death bed afflicted with throat cancer would have such a rosy outlook on life, anyway.

In Puccini's vision, maybe Turandot was successful at using her mind to make him leave, and maybe her feeling was only a temporary lift from her permanent numbness. Fire and ice are very difficult to get rid of, anyway. I doubt she believed in Happily Ever After to begin with.

I'm looking at her now, with those far away eyes, and am horrified at how perfectly she rests in my room among my things. It's almost as if she has been here all along, and is just now coming to the surface.