Jazz: Chapters 7–8

Thirteen years after Golden Gray stiffened himself to look at that girl, the harm she could do was still alive. Pregnant girls were the most susceptible, but so were the grandfathers.

Cutting cane could get frenzied sometimes when young men got the feeling she was just yonder, hiding, and probably looking at them.

One swing of the cutting blade could lop off her head if she got sassy or too close, and it would be her own fault.

One swing of the cutting blade could lop off her head if she got sassy or too close, and it would be her own fault.

Because he was more used to wood life than tame, he knew when the eyes watching him were up in a tree, behind a knoll or, like this, at ground level.

To see the two of them together was a regular jolt: the young man’s head of yellow hair long as a dog’s tail next to her skein of black wool.

To see the two of them together was a regular jolt: the young man’s head of yellow hair long as a dog’s tail next to her skein of black wool.

He couldn’t say it wasn’t possible. That he needed a midwife or a locket portrait to convince him. But the shock was heavy just the same.

Under the dirt, lacing her coal-black skin, were traces of bad things; like tobacco juice, brine and a craftsman’s sense of play.

Maybe it cracked from the inside, bored through by crawling life that had to have its own way too, and just crept and bunched and gnawed and burrowed until the whole thing was pitted through with the service it rendered to others.

Maybe it cracked from the inside, bored through by crawling life that had to have its own way too, and just crept and bunched and gnawed and burrowed until the whole thing was pitted through with the service it rendered to others.

Or maybe they cut it down before it crashed in on itself. Turned it into logs for a fire in a big hearth for children to gaze into.

They stood around at the depot, camped in fields on the edge of the road in clusters until shooed away for being the blight that had been visited upon them—for reflecting like still water the disconsolateness they certainly felt, and for reminding others about the wages sin paid out to its laborers.

They stood around at the depot, camped in fields on the edge of the road in clusters until shooed away for being the blight that had been visited upon them—for reflecting like still water the disconsolateness they certainly felt, and for reminding others about the wages sin paid out to its laborers.

Then one spring the southern third of the county erupted in fat white cotton balls, and Joe left Victory helping the smithy at Goshen for the lucrative crop picking going bn outside Palestine, some fifteen miles away.

The low fire galvanized his stare.

He and Hunter and Victory had seen traces of her in those woods: ruined honeycombs, the bits and leavings of stolen victuals and many times the signal Hunter relied on most—redwings, those blue-black birds with the bolt of red on their wings.

He managed to climb above the opening, but when he slid down and entered the rock place, he saw nothing a woman could use and the vestiges of human habitation were cold.

Whispering into hibiscus stalks and listening to breathing, he suddenly saw himself pawing around in the dirt for a not just crazy but also dirty woman who happened to be his secret mother that Hunter once knew but who orphaned her baby rather than nurse him or coddle him or stay in the house with him.

A woman who frightened children, made men sharpen knives, for whom brides left food out (might as well—otherwise she stole it). Leaving traces of her sloven unhousebroken self all over the county.

The small children believed she was a witch, but they were wrong. This creature hadn’t the intelligence to be a witch; she was powerless, invisible, wastefully daft. Everywhere and nowhere.

He would have chosen any one of them over this indecent speechless lurking insanity.

On his way to Palestine, he took every job offered or heard about. Cut trees, cane; plowed till he could hardly lift his arms; plucked chickens and cotton; hauled lumber, grain, quarry rocks and stock.

Never hurt the young: nest eggs, roe, fledglings, fry.

The third time Joe had tried to find her (he was a married man by then) he had searched the hillside for the tree—the one whose roots grew backward as though, having gone obediently into earth and found it barren, retreating to the trunk for what was needed.

Below that tree was the river whites called Treason where fish raced to the line, and swimming among them could be riotous or serene.

The slopes and low hills that fell gently toward the river only appeared welcoming; underneath vines, carpet grass, wild grape, hibiscus and wood sorrel, the ground was as porous as a sieve.

The slopes and low hills that fell gently toward the river only appeared welcoming; underneath vines, carpet grass, wild grape, hibiscus and wood sorrel, the ground was as porous as a sieve.

The slopes and low hills that fell gently toward the river only appeared welcoming; underneath vines, carpet grass, wild grape, hibiscus and wood sorrel, the ground was as porous as a sieve.

He had seen what there was. A green dress. A rocking chair without an arm. A circle of stones for cooking. Jars, baskets, pots; a doll, a spindle, earrings, a photograph, a stack of sticks, a set of silver brushes and a silver cigar case.

They agree on everything above the waist and below: muscle, tendon, bone joint and marrow cooperate. And if the dancers hesitate, have a moment of doubt, the music will solve and dissolve any question.

What they want and the prize it is his to give is his savvy self.

I rub my thumbnail over his nape so the girls will know I know they want him. He doesn't like it and turns his head to make me stop touching his neck that way.

Afterward there will be some chatter and recapitulation of what went on; nothing though like the action itself and the beat that pumps the heart.

In war or at a party everyone is wily, intriguing; goals are set and altered; alliances rearranged.