Ice And Fire

rope was just a piece of heavy rope one of the boys found

somewhere or sometimes even just a piece of clothesline stolen

from a backyard. You could hang there for as long as an hour

and the boys would threaten to leave you there and all the

girls would come and watch. And you would feel ashamed. To

be caught or not to be caught. *

When we played witch it was always the boys against the girls

and the boys always chased the girls and it was a hard chase

and we ran places we had never seen before and hid in places

we were afraid of. There was the street with the row houses

facing into it and then there were the back ways behind the

houses, and the distance between the back ways and the front

street connected by an occasional alley between the row houses

was enormous to a girl running. But we never went out of

these bounds, even when we reached the end of the boundaries

and a boy was right behind us. The street was long and at

each end it was bounded by another street and we never crossed

those streets. We never went past the two back ways on to

streets parallel to our own and we never went into foreign

back ways not behind our own houses. In this neighborhood

everyone had their block and you didn’t leave your block. Our

block was white and Jewish. The block across the street on

one end of our street was Polish Catholic. The block across

the street at the other end of our street was black. Even when

we played witch, no matter how hard you wanted to run and

get away, you never left the block.

*

I would play witch, racing heart.

*

I would play witch, wanting to be chased and caught, terrified

to be chased and caught, terrified not to be chased: racing

heart.

*

I would play witch, running, racing heart: running very fast,

running away, someone chasing: realizing: you have to slow

down to get caught: wanting to be caught: not slowing down.

*

I would play witch, already slow, barely chased, out of breath,

hiding, then wander back to where we had started, then wander

back to where the wooden cage was and see the girl hoisted in

the wooden cage, see the clothesline or rope tied to something

and the boys standing there looking up, hear the shrieking.

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Downhearted, I would wait until they let her down. All the

girls would stand around, looking up, looking down, waiting,

trying to see who it was, trying to figure out who was missing,

who got caught, who was pretty, who slowed down.

*

Inside mother was dying and outside, oh, it was incredible to

run, to run, racing heart, around the houses and between the

cars and through the alleys and into the half-open garages and

just up to the boundaries of the block, farther, farther than

you had ever been before, right up to the edge: to run with a

boy chasing you and then to saunter on alone, out of breath,

having run and run and run. If only that had been the game.

But the game was to get caught and put in the cage and hoisted

up the telephone pole, tied by rope. Sometimes they would tie

your hands behind you and sometimes they would put tape

over your mouth. The game was to be the witch and have

them chase you and catch you and put you in a wooden cage

and tie your hands and hoist you up a telephone pole and tie

the rope so the cage would stay up high: you weren’t supposed

to want to be the witch but if you were a girl and running

there was nothing else to want because the game was for the

boys to chase you. Everyone else just stood around waiting

until the boys got bored and tired and let the witch down.

*

The horses were running as fast as they could, Roy Rogers

was sort of standing up on the wagon driving them on,

shouting go boy go faster faster, and you could see the horses

streaking by up and down the roughest mountain roads, the

fringes on his cowboy jacket were all swept back by the wind,

and he looked back over his shoulder as he sort of stood up and

shook the reins so the horses would go faster and shouted how

you doing back there do you like this you uppity little thing or

something like that with his grin from ear to ear like a smartass,

and instead of the covered part of a covered wagon there was

a wooden cage like maybe from a medicine show that had a

circus and transported animals and it was heaving over the

rough roads at the full speed of the horses with Roy making

them go faster and faster and up against the slats Dale Evans

was holding on, her face all dirty, imprisoned in the wooden

cage and saying she would never speak to him and he had

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better let her go. She had been snotty to him and he had gotten

her in the cage and locked her in and taken off, making the

horses go faster and faster and she was screaming and

screaming for him to stop and saying she never would never

not as long as she lived and he was shouting back over his

shoulder as the hills flashed by and the horses’ manes stood up

on end from the wind and the fringe on his cowboy jacket

went the same direction as the horses’ manes and his gun and

holster were tied to his leg, had enough yet I’ll tame you you

little devil. Eventually she was tired and dirty and saw he was

stronger and she got quiet and loved him and he won. They

were in love then. Once she quieted down he slowed down the

horses and took her back to town, leaving her in the cage,

singing her a song. Back in town, all his friends, the Sons of

the Pioneers, got to see her come out of the cage, quiet, dirty,

and she got out of the cage, all the men knowing.

*

I had a cowgirl suit, a cowgirl hat, a gun, a holster. There was

nothing more important than being a cowboy, even though I

had to be a cowgirl because I had to wear a skirt, with fringes,

and a blouse, with fringes, and the cowgirl hat and the gun

and holster didn’t entirely make up for it. It was my favorite

thing to wear, even though we never did play cowboys and

Indians. It had more to do with wanting to be a gunslinger and

learning how to draw fast and shoot straight. I would practice

my draw for hours at a time but no one would go along with

me and have a gunfight. I would draw my gun on my father

and my brother, who would be wrestling and tickling on the

living room floor. There was vague disapproval of the gun in

the air and so I would shoot it outside and it would make a