Accident, and: Forbidden Knowledge, and: Lot and His Daughters

Abstract

Accident, and: Forbidden Knowledge, and: Lot and His Daughters Mark Halperin (bio) Accident Are you okay? When I answered yes, addingI'd already called it in and was waiting forthe tow truck, she blessed me from the cab,then Jesus for preserving me, then got down.You've no idea when the tow truck will show up;you might stand in the cold for hours, she said,moving beside the truck, which, like her,had been around, rummaging in her sacksof groceries and pulled a bagel out. Nothanks, I said. She insisted. It was easierto accept than fight with her, and beside,there was something so natural, so direct,for all the bless Jesus-es, the bagel, sosoft, topped with burnt onions, garlic chips,so bereft of any yidishkayt. . . . I took it,like her benediction, with a nod, a Jew,ankle deep in snow on a rural road ineastern Washington, car down the steepembankment, cradled by cattails. Howhad I come to be there, hand around a rollas much a bagel as I was a Jew, I wondered?Only a deity who delighted in far-fetchedscenarios could have concocted a deliverylike that. Before I took a bite, rather thana motsi, I peered at my precariously balancedcar, then into the shimmering distancefrom whence the wrecker would come.Hat on, I blessed her and my good fortune. [End Page 70] Forbidden Knowledge I When, after a few moments of standing, her armrelaxed nothing happened; she bit down. Juice randown her chin, apple-firm, pear-rich, pulpy as a plum. She looked at grass, the far horizon. Clouds stacked,one on another. She heard water, the trill of warblers.Dread passed, replaced by an anticipation. Trees flickered. The ripple across her skin could be the pinpricks oftime beginning between this one and the next. Whatstarted up again? Each action points away, yet starts from here—toward expectation? Bending to drink,you trust the throat to swallow, the body to show the way.Does fatigue lurk like a problem, or is that someone watching? II I told her nothing. Why would we speak?I reached around, behind, and lookedinto her questioning face. That tookher by surprise. Her knees grew weak. She sank so slowly to the groundshe could have been a petal. SayI told her that, as man held swayover all creatures to be found [End Page 71] in Eden, so had I; he wouldbe replaced too—the last to comerules the other. She understood,wanted a moratorium, an end to time and what it hid.Did she push me away? Whocan be sure now? Maybe I whisperedin her ear. Maybe I licked it too. And maybe all the stories showis that their tellers mistrust snakes,themselves and women. One mistakeswords for deeds, another, the glow of satisfaction for deceit—'til you suspect they're jealous ofthe two of us. And it's enoughthat we lay down. Legends compete for believers. Before there were words,there were murmurs. Desire stirsas dust does, as children clutchat fingers. Before we hear, we touch III He turned toward the center of the garden, stopped. Or I'veinvented that. She's disappeared. See her or see the tree behindher as if it moved and replaced her. She's gone. Where she'd beenawakens, as from the dream she emerged from. If she can appearafter sleeping, she can disappear while awake. After a step ortwo, there is a woman. She offers fruit. Can I go where she went?Leaves rustle, bird song crosses birdsong, underneath, theclicking of crickets and grasshoppers: a wall of moving sound.She smiles. Nothing is familiar. [End Page 72] Lot and His Daughters I Had it been revenge, to shame himas he shamed us, offering to assuagethe men that day by sending us to theminstead of giving up his visitors—asif his good name were worth ours—had it been that, we could have waitedmeekly for years to bring him low...