October Tulip and the Desert Bridegroom

In the hot sun’s light he’s perched
upon the axis of the world
rushes
ocean swirls
pools dry against the fence posts
like a wind along the jagged coast framing
a dead vast sea
and the lemon-eyed child in the shadows
that's me
watching him
watch the white unfolding sky
and I can’t understand why
he’s smiling
because, to me
loneliness must be the blackest skyline
as silent as a quarantine
and as cold as the high summer snow

I’m hiding stomach down in the black ferns
learning his inhales and exhales
like watching the sea’s tide
rising and receding
my heart’s beating like a rabbit’s
I rustle
and he startles, his rainy eyes
find mine
surprised
and he smiles
I wave timidly
creep over like a beetle
and then we wear away the day waiting
together, for what?
and he tells me, for love

dusk, when the sun falls
I slip down and sneak away to home
looking back, he stays settled on the fence
swan head tipped, bird wing shoulders back
waiting patiently
and my mother sighs when I tell her
then she laughs, bubbling laughter
and I don’t understand her

my sister tells me that night
beneath the linen sheets and moon beams
that, if the desert is a mother
then the sky must be an eternal bride
blushing and volatile at the dawn
powdering her nose white with cirrus clouds
then round sun smiling
bright and familiar
or cold and indifferent in the darker months
at dusks she applies her red rouge along the horizon
and puts on her bridal veil of stars
heavily clustered as cut diamonds
“How lovely,” my sister sighs
“to have her bridegroom kiss her deeply or
soothe her thunder storms.”
I ask her who the bridegroom is
and she says he is the sea
then I sleep and dream of waves along the sand
and lightning in the trees

in the morning the sky bride is smoke gray
and heavy with melancholy
she has her chin in her hands and is crying
feather soft tears onto my face
I call up asking if she knows
about the wedding?
she shakes her head and looks down
over he knees
and I dance around
until she claps
and the candle sun comes out
and white cream clouds blow out in a long train

I come inside and my brother dresses me
then hands me a rainbowed lantern to hold
“But I want the big one,” I tell him
and he shakes his head and hums a little
distracted
I step hard on his foot and he winces
and my sister has to break us up
“Listen,” she says to me
pointing to him, whose back is turned
“He’s proposing to Bunny today.”
my eyes kaleidoscope “Really?”
“Weddings are auspicious.”
“And Bunny doesn’t know?”
“She doesn’t.”

I let my brother hold the big lantern
I smirk at him and poke his elbow
and he’s ten windswept dunes away
we sway in time with the music coming
leather drumming and bells
and when the procession comes around the corner
I gasp and wriggle with delight
paper lights and people dressed like Jupiter
bands of pink and sweet brown, butter
and red, red everywhere, like a big beating heart
insects and silk flags and laughs
and – and it’s him!
rainy eyes on the fence post
wreathed in rare forest flowers
blooming even, in the heat
ink across his feet
I pinch my brother, “Who’s he?”
he squints at me
“Mud-head,” he says, “that’s who’s getting married.”
I gape
“You didn’t know?”
“He’s the bridegroom? He’s foreign!” I protest
“He’s Terran,” my brother corrects
“Who’s he marrying?”
my brother’s eyes slide sideways
his mouth upturned, “Ju Lai.”
“No!” I bark
“Yes. I can’t believe you didn’t know. Although,”
he adds, “no one did expect it.”

the loudest boy in the desert, on Mars
a firecracker, dynamite, never quite right
Ju Lai, a Xian, no less
the Xian, if you believed the rites
bright bone bleach hair, blood eyes
the shouts in the night
cursing in temples
picking fights
I was five when he slung me up
on his shoulders
and brought me with him to the deep woods
the forest’s dense center
where the older kids swam and danced
and laughed
he held my hand and showed me
paper insect nests, the snakes in the pools and
phosphorescent jewels in the rock
I never forgot that night
nor my mother’s anger
when I came home in the morning
centipedes swarming in a prank gone
perfectly right

I want to bite my brother, “No, no.” I say
“I don’t believe it.”
he smiles, “Whatever,” and goes back to
looking for a hare-headed girl

I stare past his back at the man from Earth
skin thin, almost translucent
veins showing pale purple and new sky blue
waiting for what? for love
and I do remember him now , waiting
in the shadows like a marsh ghost
out of place in a sea of dark faces
Ju Lai chasing him, hanging on his arm
I mean, Ju Lai chased everyone
touched anyone
his hands were always all places all at once
free in both his affection and contending
free in his homecomings and leavings
disappearing to the foreign city for months
returning only thinner and meaner and louder
than ever

my sister explained it like this, haughtily, when I’d asked,
however public his pride and peacocking had been
Ju Lai had been private
a shining enigma
he hid his sickness, his hospital visits
and his supposedly, must be, soft heart beneath
unbreakable unbeatable hard-as-meteors skin
he never let anyone in
my sister had tried, as well as my brother  (but he will deny it)
so
how much did this rainy eyes know?
how far had he burrowed beneath the surface?

the sky bride’s bridegroom is the sea
and, I think, the Earth is mostly made of water
actually, I won’t bother
Ju Lai is not a sky bride and he would hit me
if I said so
rather
he’s always been the storm that tears the fat from your bones

I watch EarthSea rainy eyes
watch me
and I blush
and rush over
I want to touch his space black hair
“Hey there,” he says, thick with accent
he’s surrounded on all sides with faces
I know
some of them grown bigger since
last I saw them
I speak quickly before I can’t,
“You didn’t tell me you were marrying Ju Lai.”
“What? Yesterday? You know I can’t say his name.”
“You can’t?”
“Not for a month, I can’t see him.”
and a cousin chimes in, “It’s tradition.”
“Ok,” I wonder, “but you’re Terran!
You can do whatever you want!”
he bursts with a laugh
the cousin clamps my head, “Quiet,” she says
rainy eyes smiles, “It’s okay.”

he holds out a hand and I take it
it’s rough and long and wide
and swallows up all my fingers
he holds them gently, pulling me
through the golden afternoon
through songs and people speaking
old prayers
until we’ve reached the west temple
all nut red clay with painted winding lines
down the sides
there’s incense smoke on the air
and people, so many people
a whole tribe and even
some silent from the north, their faces covered
watching us
but I could see their eyes were smiling

rainy eyes took his hand from mine
and put both his on my shoulders
his mouth was glowing
“Thank you for walking with me.” he says
I bob my head
“What’s your name?”
I whisper, “Tulip.”
“Can I tell you a secret, Tulip?”
I bob again
“I don’t like waiting.”
“Me neither.”
“Thank you for waiting with me,” he kisses my forehead
and leaves a burning mark there
like a third eye
and suddenly I am very shy
I touch his flowered forearms
“Bye.”
he grins, “Goodbye.”

I barrel off, head long into my brother
who’s standing close with Bunny
and I resume my earlier antics
of smirking and jabbing and lifting my eyebrows
Bunny pokes my nose, but my brother ignores me
we’re sitting in a huge crescent
before the temple entrance
spread out on polar oil colored rugs
children sitting directly on the sand
murmuring or singing over tin pipes notes

there are lanterns on either side of the doorway
where I set mine off somewhere to the right
and in the middle of the arch there is February Rose Lai
Ju Lai’s father and sweet faced priest
he’s middle aged, but incredibly tiny
and his soft edges make him look like a strange child
he’s talking to the flower bridegroom
whose name, I realize now, I don’t know
beside them, sitting on a leather strap chair
is another set of foreign features
I stare in surprise
rainy eye’s mother, earth woman, Terran skin
not speaking
maybe, she doesn’t know how?
her son leans back to whisper something to her
and she opens her mouth with a sharp crack of sound
so sudden, I jump a bit
I’ve never heard Terran before
(and hardly any Martian, for that matter)
I drink it in, the rattle snaps like sticks
that they can understand! that they’re speaking!
I listen transfixed with my feet dug in the sand

there’s a sudden hush of voice from around
and the earth woman quiets
pulses beating, soft breathing
the rush of sand on the dunes and bells
far off, coming closer
there are not as many people in this train
as there was with ours
less ancient, is a way I could describe it
less silk and flags and kites, tighter
and he is walking at the center
dressed in fire
head bare in a way my mother disapproves of
his face is pretty, but all glass sharp edges
a flash of silver at his ankles when he steps
that Bunny says are braces, “They help him walk.”
and I nod, something I’ve never seen
somehow understanding
how he’s standing

Ju Lai has his eyes forward
fastened on one point, one face
he passes through the outer edges
of his tribe’s moon gathering
one collective voice praying
elders with their faces up
and children mouthing nonsense poems
with their sisters
the people of the North stand silent
observing, although, a smaller one
has pulled down their scarf to sing

the flowered Terran is already seated
on a cushion before a crackling salt fire
the flames as water blue as his eyes
he seems to want to jump up
to run forward, speak out, but his hands do not flutter
they are pressed to his knees
the priest, his father-in-law, behind him
touches his shoulder and walks forward
to take his own grown son in his arms, his fire child
and he helps him to the ground beside
his almost-husband
then bends tree a strong woman
who grips Ju Lai’s hand for a moment
she is his healer mother and she touches
the forehead of Ju Lai and rainy eyes in turn
saying something quickly and deliberately in
words I can’t understand
then she takes her place by the earth woman
and the rest of the train, some cousins and friends
as well as a Neo, skin green as a leaf
settle around the fire’s far perimeter

the bridegrooms are not touching
kneeling straight and looking ahead
they are both smiling, but Ju Lai’s mouth is pointier
and his eyes slant up like a fox’s
and I know this because I saw a fox once
in a picture

February Rose stands backlit before the fire, his face dark
and dimpling, his earrings sparkle
I hold my breath
and he begins a story

it is the one my sister told me last night
about the great desert mother and her volatile sky daughter

he tells us of the Mother first,
fierce and vast in breadth
eating tirelessly into the face of the world
ages after it was left for dead
the thin sky above her hardly breathing
just the desert and the Milky Way towering up

the Mother’s sky daughter slept deep
in her arms
bleached of life and dreaming
she sang to her in wind and storms
that crackled across the planet

February moves around the circle as he speaks
the flames jump
and to children and adults alike
he hands tiny clay bowls filled with colored powder
red and pear green and yellow and pitch black

and when her sorrow became so great
that the ground shook and pushed up jagged peaks into the sky
the great Mother began to weep, deep echoing wails
and from the tears that ran down her face
came the sea, he, bright and moving
and he consoled her, tempered her climate
weighed down the atmosphere with water and drew in the blushing sky child
he and she met at the horizon and embraced
endlessly in all directions
and the desert sent up a joyous shout
that startled the stars and awoke the moons

heavy with heat and salt, the sky bride gave birth
to life giving air
and the planet balanced, pulled safely out of reach
of the darkness of space
the desert gave her daughter the bridegroom sea
to hold her safely in orbit
and the sea gave his bride trees to run through
and people to dance with
and flowers to wear in her hair

here February kneels and gives a bowl to Bunny
she pushes her scarf up her brow and receives it
smiling

February continues,
we are born of the desert
and in all of us is both the sky and sea
alone - we are like the sleeping sky
untethered, free and floating above the world
so light we are, that there is nothing to keep us from falling lost
straight up into the universe

the desert holds us with her fingertips
and she brings us to the sea
to the water that is in turmoil  with her most inner nature, even
for she knows we can not live without out it
we accept the sea into the sky inside us
creating and repeating the most ancient bond that gives us life

February ends his circuit between the bridegrooms
and with his child thumbs, drags a line of paint
across either side of their faces
one stark white and the other deep blue
the sky and the sea
the genesis of life on Mars and all other planets
the strongest and most special pair

I see my brother take Bunny’s hand
her face is certain and flashing like sunset
she has the bowl bobbing like a boat in her lap
and she hands it to me
“You should do it,” she whispers, “It’s your first wedding.”
I feel the smooth sides beneath my palms
cool and gently curving

February stands at his son’s side and speaks loudly
almost on the verge of tears (he’s always very emotional)
“Ju Lai, blessed as Xian, son of Thyme Yuun Xian, descendent of the South,
you have been cleansed one moon, isolated beneath Jupiter,
and now sit at the holy fire of the higher order.
If you are ready and willing to vow your devotion, fidelity, and piety, please assent.”
Ju Lai’s eyes crinkle at the word piety
he nods and mouths an affirmation
in the oldest form of our language
heavy and rushing like the wind on sand
February puts a hand down to his face
and pulls the two lines on his cheeks together
where they blend sky and light on the bridge of his nose
then he grasps Ju Lai’s wrist
and traces a symbol in his palm
it’s almost a circle, but it breaks and overlaps
on one side, like a fish

Ju Lai keeps his left palm open
facing upward on his knee
patiently waiting, untouched for a month
he looks severely at the fire
seeing nothing it seems
seeing something that I can’t see
I search and search but find nothing
but shimmering leaves

February goes to rainy eyes, then
and his see-through face cracks a smile so big
I can see all his teeth
“Ma Qing,” he says, “born Hua, son of Sun Hua, descended from Terra,
you have been cleansed one moon, isolated beneath Saturn,
and now sit at the holy fire of the higher order.
If you are ready and willing to vow your devotion, fidelity, and piety, please assent.”
Ma Qing repeats clearly the same affirmation
slow, and careful to pronounce each word
February drags the horizon across his nose
and writes a different symbol, like a cloud, in his right palm
leaving it face up in a mirror of its partner

the two men’s thumbs are hardly a breath apart
and I see Ju Lai’s twitch to touch the other for a quick second
maybe only I see
but it makes me want to giggle
February recites a prayer of the desert’s blessings
and calls up each of us to whom he handed powders
“That’s you,” my brother urges
and I stand and stumble forward uncertainly

each color is named a different blessing
mine is black like the dense breathing forest
and February touches my forehead
with a pitch dot
“You are the trees,” he says
and I give my blessing to the bridegrooms
pinching powder into their palms
Ma Qing winks at me
and I half skip back to my seat
sitting, my brother briefly touches my head
“Good job.” he says
I wiggle my nose at him

the blessings, in turn, are all given
and a pattered drumbeat begins
tapping in my ears
and the soles of my feet
Ma Qing breathes in deeply
as February sings the joining
of the sky and sea
the ring close around them singing in
as well
old words, sweet and shining
song I hear from the temple on
holy sun mornings
wrapping around, conjoining
and Ma Qing and Ju Lai reach out
to entwine their colored hands
holding fast
they stand and clasp them steady
above the fire
powder fluttering down
staining the flame prismatic
shivering dances
reaching higher and higher

everyone then sounding together
a song I’d learnt in small childhood
uncomplicated and happy
unrelenting
and with everything around me ringing
I feel my stomach soar up
filled with a trembling joy
my sister pulls me to my feet
and can’t help jumping up and down
in little bounces
my brother is holding Bunny
around her shoulders
and I’m shocked to see her crying
“Bunny, what’s wrong?” I ask
but she shakes her head, “I’m so happy.”
then I see my brother is crying too
and my mouth falls open, “When did you-“

Bunny, my sister, my brand-new beautiful sister
pulls me to her and I feel like crying, too
and why?
hugging her tightly, I’ve never felt
so much, so many at once before
we’re turned back to the fire
and I see Ju Lai fall into Ma Qing’s arms
coming together like they’ll never be apart
one being, brightly beating
and Ma Qing’s rainy eyes are closed, his nose
in Ju Lai’s hair
the latter tugs his chin down to kiss him
and I remember Ma Qing’s burning lips
on my forehead
and wonders at what they must feel like
on Ju Lai’s mouth

the congregation is loud now
a great big bell sounds
and we walk in a parade to the central wood beamed house
with a flat roof and an endless floor
it fills with us with room for more
I see Ami perched in a low window
and I run and hug her, still floating
everything golden
Ami tugs her scarf off her head
down around her neck and peers back in
through the window, inside
“There’s honey cakes!” she confides excitedly
and I push past her to look, “Can we eat some now?”
she shrugs, “I don’t know why not?”
we sneak honey cakes until we’re sick
I’ve eaten flour only a few times before
light and puffy like clouds
…I wish I could eat clouds
and Ami drags me out to dance with her
swirling and holding my wrists tight
which is less terrifying and more fun
after several minutes and Ami’s steady elbows
“Do you see?” Ami nods over my shoulder
and there’s a man enormously tall and slightly scary
standing at a carpeted wall
speaking with one of the people of the North
she has her head covering off
her ash hair long and braided, wrapped in a crown
across her forehead and her eyes are all golden
no white, piercing from even this far away
“Who do you mean?” I ask, genuinely
Ami snickers, “Both of them!”
then she nods seriously, “That woman is the Mother.”
“Really?”
the Desert Mother, the highest priest of our people
reincarnation of the most ancient seer, “Why is she here?”
“I don’t know,” Ami says, “But it’s exciting, right? I’ve only ever seen her
once before, when my uncle died.”
the Mother touches the shoulder of her still shrouded partner
and they nod in synch to the giant man
whisking through the crowd, levitating almost
not hearing the music or dancing, not eating honey cakes
or any endless number of curries

they stop at one of the smaller Northerners
the one who I saw singing at the temple
face open and smiling
the Mother speaks to them, sharply it seems
then keeps striding forward
until the pair is lost through the far door
and into dusk
“Let’s go talk to them,” I plead Ami
and she is just as curious as me

the Northerner is a boy, older than us
but not very old
with hair styled almost identically to the Mother
he has his hands out from beneath his cloak
and is holding about ten honey cakes
sticky and smashed between his fingers
“What’s your name?” we ask
“My name is Sehera Lily,” he replies, very formally
we repeat ours back
“Those are really good,” I nod at his hands
“Yes! They are. And there are so many.”
Ami takes one and eats it, “Do you want to dance with us?”
“Ah,” he tips his head, “My mother instructed me I should not.”
“Your mother?” “The Mother?” Ami and I exclaim over each other
he smiles, “Yes, my mother is The Mother. My moon mother is more common however.”
“Wow.” Ami breathes
“Well.” Sehera says cheerfully, although he seems to want to leave
“It was nice to meet you both.  I should take these cakes to my wife and my son;
he has never eaten them before.”
“Your wife?”
“Your son?”
Sehera nods, “I hope to see you again. Goodbye.”
then he turns and wades off in his long robes

Ami and I gape after him
even in the century the South has accepted the Martians
venturing into their cities and schools and farmlands
it seems the Northerners have moved up higher
and farther away, deep in the rock cliffs and polar ice caps
caught in some dawning of time with no dancing
or Terrans or pictures of foxes
I want to go after him
shower him with hundreds of honey cakes
then take him to the ravine
where we can catch frogs and howl in the night
and –
and there are so many new things I’ve seen today
mixed wildly together in my head
the red of the room around me brightens
and there is a soft shadow coming towards us
wearing a black flowered head
rainy eyes
so recently familiar, and yet, my arms reach up easily
around his waist
“Hey you.” he says
and he pats Ami on the head, “Can I steal your dance partner?”
Ami’s eyes are shiny and she bobs her head, nudges me
then scampers off, scarf lost in the crowd
“Thank you!” Ma Qing calls after her

he spins me around slowly
feet shuffling in a small sun circle
and I settle in like the wind on branches
tired, but never more awake
stealing glances across everyone
some eating, some cuddled in corners
everywhere content
thick syrup in glasses
“Did you have fun?” Ma Qing asks
and I smile sleepily
“Too much fun?”
I laugh and say the first thing there on my tongue, “I have a new sister named Bunny.”
“Oh?”
“My brother is marrying her. She’s so nice and pretty.”
“That’s wonderful!”
I smile crazy some more, “I have a new sister and you have a new husband.”
Ma Qing’s face twinkles
“Ju Lai’s not as nice as Bunny though.”
“No?”
“I wouldn’t marry him.”
Ma Qing smirks at this, “You’re actually not the first one to say that.”
“But you did.”
“I did.”
“I have to tell you a secret,” I whisper and tug his arm down
suddenly he’s picked me up, on one arm, my mouth close to his ear, “Tell me.”
I tell him when Ju Lai took me to the forest
a starry secret I’ve kept forever
I tell him about the lights and snakes and the dripping leaves
and Ju Lai dancing in the shallow pools to no music
just night sounds and rocks whistling and swishing water
“He’s not so bad.” I finish, “but my brother wouldn’t believe me.
I had to keep a secret like Ju Lai told me,”
then I add for clarity, “You can’t tell him.”
“I won’t.”
I nestle my head into his shoulder, eyelashes slipping
everything swimming
and one last whisper I hear ghosting through me
“I hope they’re just like you.”
then everything is blue

another shoulder
my brother’s
carrying me heavy towards home
I can see Bunny through half-lids
brushing my fringe across with her hand
my dream them is like a comet crashing
a brilliant flash
the flare lasts just a moment
and I’m on the fence post at feathered dusk
watching
waiting
waiting for what?
for love
gently, it beats like a rhyme in my chest

and Tulip saw the desert bridegroom
dressed in muslin glass
and like a lamplight in the night
he flickered ‘cross the sands