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fifty-nine (the wind and his wife)

by nike, May 12, 2015

ZephyrusIn the winter, the wind and his wife began to dwindle.

They put a candle in the window, to light the path to their door. No one came near but the owls, who watched the old couple bend, and fetch, and fade. They were barely a whisper, barely a wisp.

They had made a last trip to the river together. In the water the terror rose up to their shins. They waded, were wet, were damp and dishonest. They stood in the stream where their dreams they’d once dipped. They peered at the pebbles that shone in the water. That tumbled and trembled and told all their tales. The stones of their childhood, all worn now and deep-dark. The stones of their childhood, all sifted. All spent.

‘My life,’ said the wind.

‘My strife,’ said his bride.

‘Soon I will gutter,’ said the wind. ‘Soon I will gust.’

‘And go out,’ said his wife, ‘like a candle.’

They sat at the window, the wind and his wife. They lived like chaste shadows; they dawdled and dipped. They heard the owls clinking their claws on the roof. They had not an inkling of what was before them. They had no idea of who stood by the door.

The wind and his wife — a housewife! a mouse wife! — waited and listened and stoked up the fire. They boiled up their candles, they washed all the shadows, they kindled the leaves that blew in at the door. Soon, the west wind–that weasel! that wastrel!– was done. He had blown himself thin. He had wasted away.

And the wind’s wife, his mouse wife, ran out from his mantle. Was dwindled, was dinner, for two sombre owls.


An in-class writing exercise based on a little sound cloud.

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