The Tent

— Is that all?

— I’m not just anyone, he said.

— Nobody is, I said.

— You see, he said, that’s what I mean, you’re not like everyone else. You notice the details, you take the distinguishing characteristics into account, you pick out the tendencies. These are the qualities I’m looking for.

— Is this a seduction? I said.

— No. The seduction took place a while ago; you didn’t even notice it. We’re past that. We’re at the hiring stage. We’ve come to the bargaining.

— What do I have to do? I said.

— Sleep with me, that goes without saying. I’ll make it worth your while.

— What else?

— I value loyalty. Remember, you’re not a lawyer: don’t fuck the clients.

— I wouldn’t anyway. They always have bad karma. What else?

— Just what you’re already doing, he said. Some routine chores. Inhale some smoke, chew selected plant materials, tell a couple of riddles, write things on leaves. Do the odd incantation; lead a few sightseeing tours of hell. Keep up the tone of the establishment.

— No fooling around with snakes? I can’t, if there’s snakes. I have a phobia.

— Snakes were last year.

— Good. Where do I sign? Just a minute—what do I get in return?

— Women are so mercenary.

— No, but seriously?

— You’ll get wise. Wiser than you are, I mean.

— It’s not enough.

— All right: you can have some immortality. Here it is. It’s inside this bottle. See it?

— That little heap of dust?

— Look harder.

— Oh. Yes. Does it always sparkle like that?

— Only at first.

— Are you sure this is immortality?

— Trust me. With some of this, you’ll always have a voice.

— Have a voice, or be a voice?

— One or the other.

— Well, okay, thanks a lot then.

— Don’t drop the bottle. Be careful with it. You have to watch those things, they have a habit of getting bigger. They can get as big as the sky. You can be sucked into them before you know it. It’s the vacuum effect. Now set it down, over there in the corner, dump that bulky mantle, and put your arms…

— I feel dizzy. This is getting a little intense. I ate too much at lunch. I think I should go home and lie down.

— Lie down right here! You owe me, remember? No time like the present. Slit a throat, pour a libation, empty your mind, close your eyes, clear a space for me, think about caves…

— Ouch. Let go! I need to breathe. I can’t, right now. How about next week?

— Don’t you love me?

— It’s not that. It’s just—are you really who you say you are?

— I am what I am. I’m also who you say I am. That’s the way it is with gods, and I’m a god, after all.

— So there’s nothing to you. You’re only in my head. You’re just a—you’re nothing.

— More or less.

— That’s what I thought. Wait, come back!

— I’m not stupid, I recognize no when I hear it.

— I didn’t mean to be abrupt. Let’s talk.

— You can’t talk with nothing.

— But—

IMPENETRABLE FOREST

The person you have in mind is lost. That’s the picture I’m getting. He believes he is lost in the middle of an impenetrable forest. His head is full of trees. Branches he’s bumping into. Brambles he’s tangled up in. Paths that lead nowhere. Animals that jeer at him and run away. Here and there the glimpse of an elusive maiden, wearing a dress of what appears to be white cheesecloth. I’m getting some insects too, the stinging variety. This is not pleasant. The sun is sinking. The shadows are darkening. Things could hardly be worse.

Then there’s you. Where do you come into it? You’re not one to resist an opportunity, the sort of opportunity he presents. Some would call it meddling, but you think of it as helpfulness. I apologize for being so frank but I’m just the messenger. Here you come, descending in our pinkish cloud, glowing like a low-wattage light bulb or an aquarium in a chintzy bar. Feathers sprout from your shoulders, rays of light shoot out from you, silver-and-gold confetti wafts down from you like metallic dandruff. It does not occur to you that your dress is covered with tiny fish hooks. On some of them scraps of bait are still hanging: cricket wings, worm torsos, old bank deposit slips.

There there, you say. A whisk here, a flick there, with your magic wand—transparent plastic, with a miniature motorcar in it that slides up and down in a sparkly fluid when shaken—and the brambles vanish. The sun reverses direction, the paths straighten out, dawn occurs.

Voilŕ! you say. Your debts are paid, your emotional problems are solved, your illnesses are cured. Not only that, but your childhood sorrows—the ones that held you back and bogged you down—they’ve been erased. Now you can get on with it.

He looks at you without gratitude. What is this it I’m supposed to be getting on with? he says.

You don’t know? you ask, with an irritation you try to conceal. I’ve come down into this stupid woodlot, gone to major trouble, cleared away a lifetime of junk for you, and you still don’t know?

You don’t understand much, he says. Why do you think I was lost in the impenetrable forest in the first place?

ENCOURAGING THE YOUNG