Into the air, over the valleys, under the stars, above a river, a pond, a
Road, flew Cecy. Invisible as new spring winds, fresh as the breath of clover
Rising from twilight fields, she flew. She soared in doves as soft as white
Ermine, stopped in trees and lived in blossoms, showering away in petals when
The breeze blew. She perched in a limegreen frog, cool as mint by a shining
Pool. She trotted in a brambly dog and barked to hear echoes from the sides of
Distant barns. She lived in new April grasses, in sweet clear liquids rising
From the musky earth.
It’s spring, thought Cecy. I’ll be in every living thing in the world
Tonight.
Now she inhabited neat crickets on the tar-pool roads, now prickled in dew
On an iron gate. Hers was an adapt-ably quick mind flowing unseen upon Illinois
Winds on this one evening of her life when she was just seventeen.
“I want to be in love,” she said.
She had said it at supper. And her parents had widened their eyes and
Stiffened back in their chairs. “Patience,” had been their advice. “Remember,
You’re remarkable. Our whole family is odd and remarkable. We can’t mix or marry
With ordinary folk. We’d lose our magical powers if we did. You wouldn’t want to
Lose your ability to ‘travel’ by magic, would you? Then be careful. Be careful!”
But in her high bedroom, Cecy had touched perfume to her throat and
Stretched out, trembling and apprehensive, on her four-poster, as a moon the
Colour of milk rose over Illinois country, turning rivers to cream and roads to
Platinum.
“Yes,” she sighed. “I’m one of an odd family. We sleep days and fly nights
Like black kites on the wind. If we want, we can sleep in moles through the
Winter, in the warm earth. I can live in anything at all – a pebble,
a crocus,
Or a praying mantis. I can leave my plain, bony body behind and send my mind far
Out for adventure. Now!”
The wind whipped her away over fields and meadows.
She saw the warm spring lights of cottages and farms glowing with twilight
Colours.
If I can’t be in love, myself, because I’m plain and odd, then I’ll be in
Love through someone else, she thought.
Outside a farmhouse in the spring night a dark-haired girl, no more than
Nineteen, drew up water from a deep stone well. She was singing.
Cecy fell – a green leaf – into the well. She lay in the tender moss of the
Well, gazing up through dark coolness. Now she quickened in a fluttering,
Invisible amoeba. Now in a water droplet! At last, within a cold cup, she felt
Herself lifted to the girl’s warm lips. There was a soft night sound of
Drinking.
Ceсy looked out from the girl’s eyes.
She entered into the dark head and gazed from the shining eyes at the hands
Pulling the rough rope. She listened through the shell ears to this girl’s
World. She smelled a particular universe through these delicate nostrils, felt
This special heart beating, beating. Felt this strange tongue move with singing.
Does she know I’m here? thought Cecy.
The girl gasped. She stared into the night meadows.
“Who’s there?”
No answer.
“Only the wind,” whispered Cecy.
“Only the wind.” The girl laughed at herself, but shivered.
It was a good body, this girl’s body. It held bones of finest slender ivory
Hidden and roundly fleshed. This brain was like a pink tea rose, hung in
Darkness, and there was cider-wine in this mouth. The lips lay firm on the
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