The Museum of Margins, and: Mixed Marriage, and: Curator

Abstract

The Museum of Margins, and: Mixed Marriage, and: Curator Ellen Galford (bio) The Museum of Margins If you're looking for something on the topography of sidelinesthis could be the place to starta building of impossible antiquityconstructed, or so the theory goes,from shards of the shattered tabletsthat a disillusioned Mosesthrew down the mountainwhile taking aim and missinga whole herd of golden calves. Come through the gatesand you may kiss the mezuzahor genuflect or slip your shoes offor do whatever else you need to doto feel safe in the knowledge thatyou don't belong hereand that, once in, they'll let you out again. Watch your step as you skirt roundthe hidden cornerswhere old enemies meet for coffeeand those of us once kept apartby some Bronze Age diktat of forbidden fruitsfinally come together behind the bike shedsfor a surreptitious kissthat could last foreverif it doesn't blow the universe to bitsbefore next Tuesday. [End Page 167] Please also mind your footingin the draughty corridorsso as not to trip overthe recent influx of rough sleeperswho have turned, inexplicably,to stone. Now make your way to the librarystocked with books in lost languagesbearing incorrect shelf-marksand browse scrolls so oldtheir ink has fadedleaving nothing but the ends of lineswhere scribes once pausedto ease their cramping fingers.Look hard enough and you might seethese formerly blank spaces filling inwith undelivered messagesfrom the uncomfortable invisible ignored. On your way outresist the postcards in the gift shopand the calendars so out-of-datethey mark the cycles of a different sun.And finally, when looking for the exittry to avoid the one that leadsto the debatable lands between this world and the nextwhere all comers queue to show their passportshoping their documents have not expired. [End Page 168] Mixed Marriage My half-Irish-Catholichalf-Orange-Protestantentirely atheisticalGlaswegian belovedis deeply allergic to strawberries, cinnamon,and all forms of theological doctrine.She never puts her foot into a churchexcept for weddings, funerals, early music,and her weekly class in Scottish Country Dancing. My half-Irish-Catholichalf-Orange-Protestantentirely atheisticalGlaswegian belovedwould not let a Hail Mary pass her lipsbut is word-perfect in the Yiddish formulaefor deflecting Ayn-Hore, the Evil Eyeand knows, far better than I do,where to find the candles for my parents' Yahrzeits. My half-Irish-Catholichalf-Orange-Protestantentirely atheisticalGlaswegian belovedis always up for a good domestic spatover the best route to Scottish independenceor whose turn it is to clean the bathroom sink,and then it's Talmudists versus Jesuitsdancing on heads of pinsand splitting hairs at forty pacesand Heaven only knows which team will win. [End Page 169] Curator My grandmothers' grandmotherswaving from the dockfrom station platform or a market squarewatching everyone go out of sightlost to sea-fog, coal smoke, bends in roads. Letters follownews of births and deathsscored out by censors or delayed by warchanges of address that never comefrom senders unaware where they'll go next. Yet those who can will finally reunitein tattered photos whispering in my drawersome older than the century gone bysome with names and faces I don't knowbut I won't be the one to let them go. [End Page 170] Ellen Galford Although born in New Jersey, Ellen Galford has spent most of her life in Scotland. She has published four novels: Moll Cutpurse: Her True History (Firebrand Books, 1985), The Fires of Bride (Firebrand Books, 1988), Queendom Come (Virago Books, 1990), and The Dyke and the Dybbuk (Seal Press, 1994)—the last of which was the recipient of a Lambda Award for Gay and Lesbian Literature from the American Publishers Association. Galford has also contributed to anthologies on Jewish and LGBTQ themes. She is currently learning Yiddish, and some of her early experiments with Yiddish poetry have appeared...