The OrphanAGE, Vol. 1.40

First Lines

"When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle, everybody said she was the most disagreeable-looking child ever seen."
—Frances Hodgson, The Secret Garden

I once read a poem, it’s central turn: wrestling with what ought to be fit subject matter for capital-A, Art.

Utility vs Beauty. Found vs Created. Craft vs Vision… Should paintings hang only on curated museum walls? Should one concern one’s self whether or not the household cutlery is imbued with artifice?

It’s a tug-o-war as old as our very notions of art.

In this — issue 1.40 — perhaps as a tip-of-the-hat to the recent loss of Annie Dillard, the OrphanAGE finds itself on something of a naturalist’s bender: the mountains, the desert, stretches of Montana wilderness, the flowers and plants lining the lanes of Missouri’s Mark Twain National Forest, or simply a bedewed spider web discovered on a morning’s balcony.

From the high deserts to the cloistered potter’s shed, we encourage you to frolic in the juxtaposition of the found with the crafted…as well as the found incorporated into the crafted.

…beauty

I hold that beauty remains the crux. Beauty, be it lovely or harsh. Beauty…

Peace,
Dante

In This Issue

• Fiction by w.e. leathem (excerpt, part 2)
• Ceramics by Leslie Johns
• Poetry by Susan Kurtenbach

Bears (an excerpt, part 2)

by w.e. leathem

Note: In last week's issue [No. 1.39], Cass had been following the track of a large bear.

The night was warm, but her shirt was chill with sweat. Her breath drew more keenly than she wanted. Twice in the last half hour, the pre-moon darkness had seemed to shroud something moving. Off and to her left, something sizable. Animals, even the bigger mammals, tended to shy away from humans. Surely, whatever it was wouldn’t be following her? But the grind of her boots on the gravel muddied the night noises until uncertainty gnawed its unease in her stomach.

Then, through the trees, a flickering of light. Soon, the pumpkin red of a kitchen window was unmistakable.

He was in the rocking chair. Even in the dark, the porch was arboreous. Baskets hanging from the rafters, clay pots lining the steps. Two long boxes framing the sitting room windows. One end of the overhang was overrun with morning glories, snaking nimbly over from the bean trellises against the cabin’s west face. Her nostrils filled with the earthy green of things growing. She leaned her rifle against the stoop. Infusing her voice with as much brass as she could muster, she fanned her arm through the darkness. “What are we going to do with all this?”

“Where you been?” he replied, ignoring her question outright.

“Taking a look around.” The dark bled her words dry. “Following those tracks out past the point.”

“Jesus, Cass, you ain’t got the good sense God gave ya. That’s seventeen mile. They weren’t going nowhere. ’Coulda waited till we both went to have a look. What were you hoping to find…out there on your lonesome?”

“Come on, Otso.” She cocked her head, wry and a little defiant. “I had that knife you gave me…”

His laugh was deep. Those unfamiliar often mistook it for a growl. “Well, no good me trying to tell you things you damn well know already.” His eyes flitted away from hers long enough to note the rifle. Pausing an instant on the pistol holstered at her hip, they returned to her face. “Can’t imagine that ol’ knife’d do much good with anything of real intent.” With a tip of his wrist, he motioned toward a bottle and two glasses set on the upturned stump he used as a table. “Buy you a drink?”

It was the same dram he usually drank. In the window’s half-light, it glowed amber. Over the years, first while she was away at college and then the months overseas, followed by the years trying to make a go of it with Jack back in Seattle, Otso had perfected his, what did he call it? Honey-mead.

Born of a slew of hives kept out back of the house, on the tongue, as golden as it looked. Laced with alfalfa, maybe a hint of morning glory, it tasted like the overgrown porch smelled. Only sweeter. Yet, there was something stronger at the back end of it. Just what, she’d never asked.

“You ever drink anything else?”

“Hrmph.” The rumble came from deep in his throat. Pouring two glasses, he passed her one. “Why? This suits me fine.”

His knife, a sister to the one he’d gifted her, stood driven into the wood of the timber railing within reach. Over his shoulder, the twin barrels of his breakaway leaned unrestful, close to hand. Had he been watching for her?

“How long you been sitting?” she asked.

“Since before you were born.” Again he barked his throaty chuckle. “Eat anything?”

“Some jerky. Couple energy bars I brought along…God, I could eat a horse.”

“Well, don’t let her hear you say that. Words carry, and the barn ain’t that far… And, as you well know…” Was that the flicker of a grin? “…that’s one prescient mare.”

After a pause, he went on, “Half a meat pie on the counter. A handful of string beans, pulled yesterday. Carrots. Taters. All fresh from the dirt. Used some of that ewe Hank brought us. Even threw in a few fuzzy ears of the grey sage and a sprig of that rosemary from down by the mailbox.”

“Better be careful. Before you know it, you’ll have one of those cooking shows on the cable…” Stepping past him, she picked up her gun and went on in. He stood. For a long minute, he stared into the evening. Then, he followed.

She awkwardly ladled a slice from the pan into a bowl. Placed it in the nuker and hit cook. By the time she took a seat at the table, she wasn’t at all sure that she’d have the strength to get back up. In the kitchen, he clinked crockery and glass, tapped a spoon on the lip of a mug. The microwave whirred into action for a second time.

“Drink that,” he said, setting a cup beside her bowl. “Steeped some fennel. A slice of ginger. Some rose and a squeeze of lemon. It’ll take the edge off of what you done to yourself. You’re gonna feel it tomorrow. Worse the next.”

She nodded.

“You’re a grown woman, Cass. You can take care of yourself a damn sight better than most. Like it or not, you’ve sprung from me, and there’s wild in ya. Kay, for being a city woman, is no delicate, wilting thing either. You got your looks from her, that’s for certain. I’m grateful for that, though I say the Boroten in ya clarifies even those. Easy on the eyes, your mother, but a vein of steel running from that bull-head of hers right down her spine. You got that too. Anyway, what I’m saying is don’t be shy of the blood in your veins. We saw what we saw. And there are curious things out under the moon that yet remain to be dissected in some damn textbook.” He huffed beneath his breath, as if to himself. “Borotens can entertain a few surprises of our own.” Then, again, his voice full-throttle, “Keep your wits about you. Your instincts will see you through.”

She left her bowl in the sink. He was back out on the porch. Slowly rocking. The smell of his three-day-old cigar, stale and acrid, like atumning sawgrass, drifted in through the screen.

She barely recalled slipping into bed. Later, there was a dream of wind in the trees, violent and storm-ridden, that simply would not let up.

Ceramics by Leslie Johns

See more at Not Your average Pot.

Susan Kurtenbach

beyond

beyond
is there something beyond
what lies beyond the mountain
that lies in front of me?
the mountain covered
in scrub bushes of dark green,
the tan earth showing between in little bits,
the ridgeline that I'm in love with,
I realized only a year or two ago

the sky, pale blue
and insubstantial above the mountain,
above its line, all the way
to some planet unseen

this view
is what surrounds me,
delineates my space,
my location, my center point,
this view in 360,
my shallow bowl and my circular box
I am a pea in this bowl,
or a fresh tomato
cradled by these mountains,
my cradle

happy. safe. wanted.
mostly invisible,
living my life, so blessed,
my golden years, maybe

the wind sounds as it moves
the tree branches every now and then,
singing in a hush, a whisper

What is beyond?
Is there beyond?

should I care or wonder
when there are other things
to wonder about?
better just to stay aware,
wonder an option,
like playing solitaire