I want to fix within your mind, the image of a colossal woman sprawled on a beach, on the foam. An enormous body. She is lying at the exact point where the water turns to a spittle-foam before it dries on the shore.
When the water comes in, it leaps and runs up her ears and pushes its
way into her nostrils and mouth and eyes, eyes which are only partially
shut. She does not seem to mind that her hair and lashes are now dotted
with dark granules of sand. A small deposit of sand has collected in the
inner eye socket. She is slowly being covered with a thin layer of sand.
Her legs are closed and
lean to the left side. It is as though she has been caught in a still, while
exercising.
Now consider her immensity.
She is over sixty feet tall, tall as a house, taller.
Her wrist alone is the size of your waist.
She is off the shore of Galway, pre-christian Ireland. There is the stink
of miracle as the swans of the city harbor paddle and flock around her.
They nip her, to see what she is made of, if she will feed them. Consequently,
she is blue. The ships drag her out to the far sea and then to Bloody Head.
For news has it that a similarly large woman has landed two hundred miles
north, at Bloody Head. She is found clutching a small gold bell in her hand
and a chest inlaid with pieces of lapis and garnet, round emeralds and mother-of-pearl.
Villagers from inland gather to see these huge white mounds of thighs and
breasts. From the delicacy of their hands and features they are proclaimed
to be princesses from a far away continent. The bodies do not deteriorate
but harden into limestone which is, conveniently, sadly, washed away.
The villagers look on the process with an acceptance of the fantastic. It
is happening under their sun, in this air. They are content. The world is
awash with the inexplicable.
In a small pamphlet in the coat pocket of a budding Christian, imported
from Rome, is the life of one martyr whose body, through prayer, is now
transparent and whose heart hisses continuously in the rain. Strangely enough,
she has your name; her birthplace and yours coincide. She was washed ashore.
An absurd doubt forms in my mind: have you embraced a new religion, become
a foreign saint?
Has this new religion enveloped you in its heart, erased even my memory?
What am I to do now with these wornout gods-- I have become a mere cobweb
of terror and magic stuck to this location--how shall I approach you? According
to these pages, people have recorded miracles at your tomb. The golden ball
leaps out of my hand, as if possessed.
