My Mother is a Fish
By Andrew Blair Thornton
My mother is a fish. We are all here waiting for something to happen. My mother is very still. She isn’t waiting on anything because she is a fish. The door is open, but there is no breeze. There is a ceiling fan, but it won’t spin. Other than the still, there is only the heat. My mother is still cool because she is a fish. I am sitting in her spot with her pillow on my back. Her pillow is sticking to me because of the sweat. I am wearing my shoes, but they’re too small and so are the prints they leave on the carpet dust. There is dust on the song books, too. Soon there will be dust on my mother because she is a fish. She is wearing her favorite dress. The dress is red and so are the words my grandfather is reading. “We gather here today in loving memory of Sister...” Streams are beginning to form. Now the words are wet, and her dress is flowing. I brought her lilies. I look down at the lilies, but I see magnolia flowers.
I think back and I can see the rest of the magnolia tree. The tree is tall, much taller than the red brick house. The bricks are floating because the ground is flooded. It has been three days since it rained. The air is still hot, but now it’s sticky, too. Crickets chirp across the water, the crickets we used to fish with.
There is drumming from a part of the yard that I am unable to see. When I look towards the drumming, I see the oaks. Unlike the magnolia, they are tall and straight. With the cadence of the drum and the lines of the oaks, there is melody in the cricket’s chirps. I pick up my grandfather’s gun and follow the sound towards the oaks. The grass is filled with stickers that will make you bleed if you’re not wearing shoes. I’m wearing my shoes. They’re still too small, and now my feet hurt.
"And the Lord carried him out in the spirit of the Lord, and set him down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones."
I pass the compost pile. The roots clutch and the branches grow, resurrected, from this loamy rubbish. The sun still beats down, but now there are trees for shelter. Now the brick is wet, and the crickets are relieved. My father once read to me “April is the cruellest month,” but I don’t believe it. If this land was dead there would be no lilies. The magnolia roots would not be stirred by spring rain. I hear the drumming so I move on.
"And he said unto Ezekiel, Son of man can these bones live?"
The wet has seeped through my too-small shoes. I should have worn my boots like I did the day I crossed the river. I was waiting on something that day too. I walked through the river with crickets in my left hand and rod in my right. I sat on the dirt bank and watched the river burn in the sun and wondered why the tree at the edge of the river wouldn’t light.
I thought about that tree for a long time before the rod bowed. My fish ran downstream, he didn’t understand that I was trying to guide him out of that burning river. Now my fish was on the bank, slapping the red dirt with its tail. I stood there watching him and thinking of how bright this world must look to my fish. My fish laid very still. I scooped him up, and we crossed back over the river towards home. We passed through a field, and I heard the grass whisper about my fish. I smiled when I heard the whispers because I knew the clouds would come. When the clouds saw my dusty fish they washed him clean.
“And the breath came into them and they stood upon their feet.”
The drumming is louder now. I’m by the garden and I can smell the tomatoes and the dirt. There are eleven tomatoes on the vine. One of them has over-ripened and fallen to the ground. Its red is growing darker. A line of ants marches towards its next supper, following like those four fishermen followed.
I keep going, and the drumming tree grows. I follow its shadow so I can’t be seen. Now it is the tallest tree. I’m surprised the woodpecker is this high because her drumming is so loud. She is the same color as the oak except for her head. Her head is the same color as the tomatoes. I aim and the drumming stops. The crickets lose their melody as she falls to the ground. It takes a long time because she was so high up. Now she is a fish, too.
THE END