amateur astronomy
october 20th, 2000

Well, I wrote something else last night, wandering around the observatory, 
waiting for the lab to begin. I thought I would post it to see what 
everyone thought. (I also had a dream that a gouged a small hole in my 
index finger, and when I woke up this morning, it was hurting.)

Amateur Astronomy
by devon koren

The bees are silent tonight. We count each toe gingerly; we are afraid of 
waking them. My footfall is as soft as Death. Donovan told me to climb the 
highest mountain I could find tonight. He wanted me to understand . making 
sure I could see everything.

A fist unclenches inside me. I should have brought a coat, I think, as I 
pick beggar-lice from the hems of my jeans and put an awry shoelace back 
in its place. Crickets and tree frogs serenade the peach-tinged horizon as 
it slowly bleeds into the forthcoming night. Thrushes knock at me for 
invading their territory. The city lights are sprawled out beneath me. A 
white cat licks its paw and slowly backs away.

.What stars will you name tonight?. Donovan asks, and presses the heel of 
my hand with his forefinger. It is an intimate gesture . we are left to 
guess at its meaning as we are left to guess the formation of the city 
streets below. It could all be figured with numbers, I am sure, but I.m 
all thumbs with figures like these, and Donovan.s only musically 
mathematical.

I want to kick off my heels. We ascend this autumn graveyard . leaves and 
twigs that carpet the stratified mounds of the earth below. Spiders are 
trying to catch me . their translucent webs get stuck in my hair, cling to 
my forearms and fingertips. (Sometimes I feel as if the whole world wants 
to make a meal out of me, but I don.t show it.)

I hover in my loose-weave sweater as Donovan adjusts the wheels on the 
telescope. We knock on the door of the House of Cepheus to allow for 
diffraction. I dig into the gravel to find a place to hide . a hole deep 
enough that light can.t even escape.

.Altair. Deneb. Vega.. Donovan recites the names as if they were an 
incantation, as if he were trying to resurrect a season no longer 
celebrated.

.That.s the summer triangle,. I whisper. .We need the autumn markers..

What are the autumn markers, I wonder? We try to stick orange leaves to 
the sky, but we simply aren.t tall enough. We sift through the red light 
for star charts and crossbars, but we come up empty-handed. The change in 
the seasons colours me confused. We are lost.

We trace the celestial meridian with our flashlights. At thirty-six 
centimeters, we slice through Polaris.s outline with gloved hands. Donovan 
plays his guitar and I.m suddenly too shy to speak to him. How is it we 
can know each other so entirely and still be complete strangers? He shrugs 
his shoulders. I never have to tell him what I.m thinking.

We confound each other.s variables. I try to transcribe his philosophies 
but my handwriting fails miserably. I pull over to the side of the road, 
drenched in the smell of skunk and exhaust, trying to paraphrase him, 
trying to create something worth his attention. One foot dangles 
precariously out the window. I hook my little finger around a toe, and he 
smiles at me. A lunar eye winks bloodshot on the horizon.

We are caught in that primeval landslide. I cling to Cygnus.s feathers for 
dear life. There are sirens somewhere in the distant West; we acknowledge 
them superficially. Our bodies become nothing but honey. We are surrounded 
by the soft noise of a million tiny wings.

I wake up naked and shivering. Donovan left me sometime in the night, 
lacing up his cosmic wheels and hitting the road with an outstretched 
thumb. I am covered in purplish, star-shaped bruises where he kissed me; 
the morning is covered in silver, star-shaped patches of frost that crunch 
beneath the footsteps of the sun. And it is everything, though I don.t 
pretend to understand.