Paul Kahn

From Périple

The Woman on the Moon

I was dreaming I had gone to the Moon. She had spent the day driving to the factory where the engines were manufactured for the rockets that hurled satellites into space. She had told him about the tour of the assembly plant followed by the testing stands surrounded by forests. The two old men had sat in the back of the car, arguing about the plans for their project while she drove the car.

What color is the Moon, he asked. He could feel it was morning, but the light was very faint. He kept his eyes closed and moved his arms around her. He placed his head behind her head on the pillow, so that his mouth was beside her left ear.

Everything is gray, she said. The shadows are green. The shadows come from the light of the oceans overhead. She was lying quietly beside him. He could feel the heat of her body on his arms. There is no life on the Moon. Nothing is moving. Then I came into a crater and it was filled with light. The light was so strong that it burned my eyes.

I’ll tell you the story of the woman who went to the Moon, he said. He was speaking directly into her ear. The woman was walking through a crater and the ground was covered with the rocks. There are two kinds of creatures that live on the Moon. There are silver octopus that lives in the cracks in the rocks and overhead are brightly colored parrots.

Whenever she stopped walking she could feel the arms of the octopus gently moving around her legs. It reminded her of the sand shrimp when she walked along the beach. If she stopped walking in the shallow water, the shrimp would move between her toes. When she stopped, the fingers of the octopus came up from the ground and circled her ankles, then moved up her calf towards her knees. The parrots would land on her head and spread their wings over her hair. She would rest for a moment and when she began to move, the arms would fall away like seaweed. The parrots would rise up and join the others flying in the air.

There is life on the moon, she said, and there is a king. She was looking for the king, the Man in the Moon. He is a giant with very long legs. His face is at the very top, very far away.

She was going to find the Man in the Moon, he said. There was no other sound in the bedroom. He had chosen a clock for the night table that did not tick. The clock had no light to illu­minate the numbers marking the time. The Man on the Moon is very tall. She could see him from far away. As she approached, she could see him standing like an enormous tree in the middle of an open field. When she stopped walking she was standing in front of him. She could feel the octopus moving around her feet, coming from several directions. There were many different arms touching her now, and each one wrapped a finger around one of her feet and began to move slowly up her legs. The parrots nestled in her hair and began to remove their feathers. She could feel that her hair was covered in bright colored feathers and the ­parrots were flying away. Other parrots would land on the shoulders of the Man and then rise up into the air and circle overhead. The only thing covering her body now was the silver tentacles woven around her legs and the covering of feathers in her hair. The Man was looking at her, standing in front of her.

I’ve come from very far away to see you, she said to the Man. She was looking up at his face. His skin was a mixture of silver and gray. His skin was as bright as the color of his eyes.

He bent down towards her face. As his body bent forward, she could see that he was flat. He looked like a card bending over from the sky.

You have a choice, said the Man. You can return to where you came from now. You can return to your husband, to your children and your family. You can open your eyes and you will be back where you came from in a moment. Or you can decide to stay on the Moon.

He could feel her hair against the lids of his eyes. How does the story end, he asked.

I want to stay on the Moon, she said to him.

As soon as she spoke, the Man reached out his hands and grasped her ribs. His thumbs were under her breasts and his ­fingers covered the skin on her back. She could feel the moisture on her skin sinking into his hands. He lifted her into the air. She felt the tentacles sliding off her legs and the feathers falling from her hair as she rose up into the air. He lifted her up to his face and looked into her open eyes.

Do you want to live alone, the Man asked her, or do you want me to swallow you?

I would like you to swallow me, she answered, so I can stay with you.

And then he swallowed her whole, she said.

Then she was floating. She began to move her arms as if she were swimming and she was flying inside his chest. The front of his chest was made of glass and she could look through the glass at the surface of the Moon. Reflected in the glass she could see the image of a little doll with the tail of a fish.