☼ RUTH OF HOUSE IESHAN ☼רות
"O YOU MISUNDERSTAND, / a game is not a law, / this dance is not a whim, / this kill is not a rival. / I crackle through your pastures / I make no profit / like the sun / I burn and burn, this tongue / licks through your body also."
"O YOU MISUNDERSTAND, / a game is not a law, / this dance is not a whim, / this kill is not a rival. / I crackle through your pastures / I make no profit / like the sun / I burn and burn, this tongue / licks through your body also."
I am more than familiar with disdainful silence.
It is hard, I think, for most people to resent me properly. It is hard for them to even get angry with me - I am rarely offensive enough for that. But it is not difficult for them to tell me that I do not belong, that I have transgressed, that I am distasteful. I don’t care, or maybe sometimes I do. Maybe sometimes I feel like I used to, when my brothers (yes, brothers) would mock my plain coloration and dull personality, remind me for themselves that I would never quite belong in our house. Maybe sometimes it reminds me of the way that Pilate only sighs despairingly at me, never bothers to scold; or the way that Adonai has always been content to keep his eyes turned away from mine, to never speak to me unless spoken to; or the way that Hagar trusts me implicitly but does not especially like me. The only one of them that has ever been apt to care for me is Miriam, and she cares for all of us.
Mother preferred not to look at me. (She was like Adonai, in that.) I saw nearly nothing of Father. They let me have my way, and I suppose it was enough. I’m not convinced that warmth would have done a thing for a creature like me, much less approval, but-
I gave up on being anything but disappointing years ago.
His drawn-out quiet tells me exactly what he thinks of my treatment of my brother. (I don’t care. He doesn’t know a thing; not of what is really wrong with my brother and certainly not of what it means.) Perhaps, he says, finally, his tone noncommittal.
I don’t know if he believes me or not, or what he thinks of my intentions - but I suppose that it doesn’t matter. I am rarely believed anyways.
And what quality is that? he asks, and I look at him again. I am tempted to say guess, or evade the question entirely; but I offered it to him, so I don’t snatch it back now. Instead, I look away, at the sea, and I wonder how I should put it. How I should phrase it. How could anyone but me even make sense of it?
(How could they know how desperately I long to be normal? How could they ever possibly understand what it means to have some part of myself simply absent, to know what is normal only by the act of comparison-?)
“There are certain things," I say, finally, “that I cannot feel, and, because I do not feel them - I never panic when someone is dying in front of me. I can work on the most difficult and dangerous cases without being troubled, or afraid.” I pause, then, and lick the taste of sand and desert winter off my lips. “I can never remember when to smile at parties, though.”
@Vercingtorix || <3 || atwood, "fox/fire song"
It is hard, I think, for most people to resent me properly. It is hard for them to even get angry with me - I am rarely offensive enough for that. But it is not difficult for them to tell me that I do not belong, that I have transgressed, that I am distasteful. I don’t care, or maybe sometimes I do. Maybe sometimes I feel like I used to, when my brothers (yes, brothers) would mock my plain coloration and dull personality, remind me for themselves that I would never quite belong in our house. Maybe sometimes it reminds me of the way that Pilate only sighs despairingly at me, never bothers to scold; or the way that Adonai has always been content to keep his eyes turned away from mine, to never speak to me unless spoken to; or the way that Hagar trusts me implicitly but does not especially like me. The only one of them that has ever been apt to care for me is Miriam, and she cares for all of us.
Mother preferred not to look at me. (She was like Adonai, in that.) I saw nearly nothing of Father. They let me have my way, and I suppose it was enough. I’m not convinced that warmth would have done a thing for a creature like me, much less approval, but-
I gave up on being anything but disappointing years ago.
His drawn-out quiet tells me exactly what he thinks of my treatment of my brother. (I don’t care. He doesn’t know a thing; not of what is really wrong with my brother and certainly not of what it means.) Perhaps, he says, finally, his tone noncommittal.
I don’t know if he believes me or not, or what he thinks of my intentions - but I suppose that it doesn’t matter. I am rarely believed anyways.
And what quality is that? he asks, and I look at him again. I am tempted to say guess, or evade the question entirely; but I offered it to him, so I don’t snatch it back now. Instead, I look away, at the sea, and I wonder how I should put it. How I should phrase it. How could anyone but me even make sense of it?
(How could they know how desperately I long to be normal? How could they ever possibly understand what it means to have some part of myself simply absent, to know what is normal only by the act of comparison-?)
“There are certain things," I say, finally, “that I cannot feel, and, because I do not feel them - I never panic when someone is dying in front of me. I can work on the most difficult and dangerous cases without being troubled, or afraid.” I pause, then, and lick the taste of sand and desert winter off my lips. “I can never remember when to smile at parties, though.”
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HE FEEDS ME RED MEAT / HE WATCHES THE BLOOD POOL IN MY MOUTHlaughs at my red teeth❂please tag Ruth! contact is encouraged, short of violence
