Jason & Medeia by Gardner John

Author:Gardner, John [Gardner, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy, Classics, Historical, poetry, ebook, book
ISBN: 9781453203323
Amazon: B00AG8GWIA
Goodreads: 19280396
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 1973-01-01T08:00:00+00:00

14

I stood, by the goddess’ will, in Medeia’s room. Pale

light

fell over her, fell swirling, burning on the golden fleece beside her, and then moved on, moved past the two old

slaves

to the door where the children watched. I could not

look at them

for pain and shame. Dreams they might be, as old and

pale

as ghosts in the cairns of Newgrange, but dream or

solid flesh,

they were children, inexplicably doomed. How could

I close my wits

on truths so weird? (Who can believe in the spectre

who walks

leukemia wards, who stands severe above laughing girls whose hearts pump dust? Who can believe those

pictures in the news

of a million children, senselessly cursed, dying in

silence,

caught up in Dionysos’ wars, or the refugee camps of Artemis? ) All time inside them … And then I did

look,

searching their eyes for the secret, and found there

nothing. Softly,

my guide, invisible around me, spoke. “Poor dim-eyed

-stranger,

you’ve understood the question, at least. Look! Look

hard!

Study their eyes, windows of the world you seek and

they

have not yet dreamed the price of: the timeless instant.

They have

no plans, only flimmering dreams of plans, intentions

dark

as the lachrymal flutter of corpse-candles. Their time

is reverie.

But already will is uncoiling there. They flex their

fingers,

restless at the long dull watch. The garden is filled with

birds,

bright sunlight. They remember a cart with a broken

wheel, a cave

of vines by the garden wall. They have now begun to be of two minds. Now love and hate grow thinkable, sacrifice and murder, mercy and judgment. And now,

look close:

with a glance at each other—sly grins, infectious, so

that we smile too,

remembering, projecting (for we, we too, were children

once,

slyly becoming ourselves, unaware of the risk)—they

step,

soundless as deer, to the doorway and through it to

their liberty.

Or so they guess, unaware that the house will vanish,

and the garden—

and the palsied slaves they’ve slipped they will find

transmogrified

to skulls, bits of ashen cloth, dark bone. And they’ll

wring their hands,

restless again, and search in children’s eyes for peace, in vain. Yet there is peace. Strange peace: from the

blood of innocents.

You’ll see. The gods have ordained it.” I stared, alarmed

at that,

and snatched off my glasses to hunt with my naked

eyes for the shade—

she-witch, goddess, I knew not what—but no trace

of her.

I turned up the collar of my coat, for the room had

grown chilly. And then

she spoke one brief word more: “Listen.”

On the bed, eyes staring,

Medeia spoke, ensorcelled—death-pale lips unmoving. I glanced, alarmed, at her eyes and my glance was held;

I seemed

to fall toward them, and they weren’t eyes now but

pits, an abyss,

unfathomable, plunging into space. I cried out, clutched

my spectacles.

The wind soughed dark with words and the pitch-dark

wings of ravens

crying in Medeia’s voice:

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