West he followed the roar, seeing nothing, and south towards the river and its bridges. Found again, lost again, he thought. The father must live. Time flowed through him. Being was. Balanced he flowed with time and being, following the lion, his face cleaving the air, his mind singing wordlessly.
Alone among those he walked with on the streets he listened to the roar that led him on, came to the embankment. Spanned by its bridges the river flowed beneath the sky. Boaz-Jachin did not hear the roaring again. He sat down on a bench facing the river, took out his guitar and played lion-music softly.
The day faded, the moon appeared in the sky and in the river. Boaz-Jachin played his guitar, waiting.
34
On the morning after his first night at home Jachin-Boaz awoke without an erection. Hello, infinity, he thought. He remembered now that most of the time for the last few weeks he had not had an erection on waking. He sighed, thought of yellow leaves falling, quiet bells in monasteries, cool tombstones, poets and composers who had died young, pyramids, broken colossal statues, dry wind in the desert, grains of sand blowing, stinging, time.
Last night they had made love, and as always it had been good. Someone had felt good — he, she, it, they. Jachin-Boaz wished them all the best of luck in their new venture. The earth had to be populated with people for the aloneness to wear. Congratulations.
Gretel was still asleep. He put his hand on her belly under the blankets. One more brain to hold the world in. One more world-carrier. Like a disease the world was passed from one to the other, each to suffer alone. And yet — tiny sunrise, catch it before it’s gone — the aloneness was in fact no worse than it had ever been. Even now with death coursing through him with every beat of his heart it was no worse. Secure in the womb he had been alone. The terror that was now was then as well. The terror inseparable from the primal salt, the green light through the reeds. The terror and the energy of life inseparable. Secure with his wife and son he had been alone, pulling the blankets of every day over his head to shut the terror out.
Here, anchorless and lost in this time with Gretel he was alone with the terror but no more alone than the person-to-be in her womb. Sunrise, caught. Night again. Hello, night. No darker than ever. No darker than before I was. No darker than for you in her belly before your beginning. It takes a million noes to make one yes. Who said that? I said it.
He got out of bed, stood up naked, stretched, looked at the not-yet-morning light in the window, listened to birds singing. I said I’d tell her, he thought.
He said he’d tell me, thought Gretel with her eyes closed.
He gently uncovered her, kissed her belly. I’ve told her, he thought.
He’s told me, thought Gretel. What? She kept her eyes closed, heard Jachin-Boaz in the bathroom, heard him dressing, making coffee, going out. I don’t think he bought meat, she thought. I don’t think he took meat with him.
Summer, thought Jachin-Boaz. Seasons pass, the air on my face is mild, the day that is coming will be a summer day. This is better than my selfish rage in the hospital. There is no magic, nothing and no one to help me. Cool before the dawn I must do it alone, up from nothing, out of nothing. In his hand was the rolled-up master-map. Across the street stood the lion. Jachin-Boaz took from his pocket an envelope addressed to Gretel, a cheque in it payable to her for all the money in his account. He posted it in the letterbox near the telephone kiosk. The telephone kiosk was still lit. The chestnut tree, wet with morning, was in full leaf. The lion-smell hung stilly in the air.
‘No meat,’ said Jachin-Boaz to the lion. He turned and walked towards the river. The lion followed. As on the first day, a crow flew overhead. Jachin-Boaz came to the bridge, turned right, walked down the steps to the part of the embankment below street level. On his left were the parapet and the river, on his right the retaining wall. Behind him the steps to the bridge, ahead of him a railing at the edge of the stonework and the water stairs. The lion followed. Jachin-Boaz turned and faced him.
No magic. Reality unbearable, inescapable. Violent death. Violent life. Being beyond all reasonable bounds. Being unbounded, terrifying, violent medium of death and life, indifferent to both, contemptuous of mortal distinctions. Frowning brows. Amber eyes luminous and infinite. Open jaws, hot breath, pink rasping tongue and white teeth of the end of the world. Jachin-Boaz smelled the lion, saw him breathe, saw the breeze stir his mane, saw the muscles taut beneath the tawny skin. Immense, the lion, dominating space and time. Distinct, forward of the air around him. Immediate. Now. Nothing else.
‘Lion,’ said Jachin-Boaz. ‘You have waited for me before the dawns. You have walked with me, have eaten my meat. You have been attentive and indifferent. You have attacked me and you have turned away. You have been seen and unseen. Here we are. Now is the only time there is.
‘Life,’ said Jachin-Boaz. He took one step to the left. ‘Death,’ he said. He stepped back to the right. ‘Life,’ he said, looked calmly at the lion, shrugged.
‘There are no maps,’ said Jachin-Boaz. He unrolled the map in his hand, rolled it the other way to flatten it, lit a match, set it afire. Flames danced up. He dropped the map as the flames consumed it, oceans and continents darkened, writhing in the fire.
‘No maps,’ said Jachin-Boaz.
He remembered Boaz-Jachin as a baby, laughing in his bath in the sink. He remembered his wife singing. He remembered the feel of Gretel’s belly against his mouth, remembered Boaz-Jachin as a boy standing outside the shop and looking in through the window, his small mysterious face shaded by the awning. He remembered the palm trees and the fountain in the square.
‘No way back,’ said Jachin-Boaz.
As long before, words appeared in his mind, large, powerful, compelling belief and respect like the saying of a god in capital letters:
TO SING IN THE PRESENCE OF A LION
Jachin-Boaz looked into the eyes of the lion. Someone was coming down the steps from the bridge with a guitar, was playing the guitar, was playing lion-music.
Jachin-Boaz was not trembling. His voice was firm. He was surprised at how strong his voice was, how pleasing. He sang:
Lion, lion, ten thousand years,
Ten thousand more and still
The motion of your running,
Tawny, great, the motion of your running
Printed on the air.
The earth upon your amber eyes, lion,
Ten thousand years, ten thousand more.
Dead the kings are, lion,
Fleshed with earth their bones,
The earth upon your amber eyes,
Like a window you looked through it, lion.
The wheel you died on turns, you rise.
The river and the bridges, lion,
Crossings always, birds of morning,
The motion of your running,
Tawny, great upon the air.
The air was dense and shimmering, thick with time. The taste of salt was in the mouth of Jachin-Boaz, Boaz-Jachin. Ocean behind him, the father saw the lion through the green light in the reeds, ceased to be himself, and only was. A channel through which life surged up, returned again to earth, to ocean. Immense in him a million rising noes to make one yes. No words. No no great enough. Jachin-Boaz opened his mouth, Boaz-Jachin opened his mouth.
The sound filled all space like a river in flood, a great river of lion-coloured sound. From his time, from the tawny running on the plains, from the pit and the fall and the oblong of blue sky overhead, from his death on the spears in the dry wind forward into all the darknesses and lights revolving to the morning light above the city and the river with its bridges the lion, father, son sent his roar.