Roots Read online

  Roots

  Sunlight warms the square; sheepish puddles languish on shining stone tiles. A breeze plays with the leaves, chasing them under benches and in and out of doorways as they frolic and mutter amongst themselves. There are feathers of strange birds and bright swirls of paint and dark, sweet-smelling woods. But enjoy it while it’s here, for the future is overcast, and powerful winds are blowing.

  The morning mist has fled before the morning sun.

  You’re in high spirits, striding through the town, in a rush but with nowhere to go. You know the roads but you are lost. People are all around you but you’re on your own. You do not want to think about these things, so you shake the thoughts from your head and keep on walking.

  There are barriers in your path and progress is laboured. The dull herd of wanderers and dawdlers parts sluggishly and coalesces in the wake of your manifest urgency. Why are they all so slow? Do they know where they are going? If they could all just get out of your way, or, better yet, disappear completely—Hush now, destiny is patient. Do not wish yourself alone. In all the earth, there is no place dedicated to solitude. Come, slow down, and see.

  You cut down an empty side road, away from the suffocating throng. There is no one in your way, and you feel totally unburdened. Other people are an obstruction and you are free. You sweep swiftly over the open cobbles between whitewashed walls, and you are happiest here. It is easy here. Without warning, wind whips past your face, and you turn away and close your eyes for just a moment. And in that moment, a short Asian boy has appeared at the end of the street.

  Red-tailed hawks call from across the ocean, their voices carried on dry desert winds. The death rattle of the beautiful diamondback and the insistent beat of the water drum. Don’t be seduced.

  You gaze long at him and he also gazes into you. The air holds its breath. He is eight or nine years old, and small for his age, although still slightly too tall for his immaculate dinner jacket. Pristine white shirt, carbon black suit. The crisp bowtie completes the image. He was evidently startled by your coming upon him so suddenly, but he composes himself more quickly than you can. Smiling sharply, he resumes his spirited, bouncing gait and the happy little tune he was buzzing with his sky blue kazoo. You act unfazed, try to force a chuckle – how ludicrous! – but it catches in your throat, and you can’t quite unknit your brow. With the boy still some distance off yet, you about-turn and retrace your steps up the tributary of the ponderous thoroughfare. The wind drives at your back.

  Rejoining the heavy multitude, you start to feel part of a flow. A collective consciousness has begun to take hold. Is this the direction you were heading before? You can’t remember, but there is no doubt that it’s the right way now. You all march together, relentlessly, ever westward. You are coming.

  The wind is less violent than it was, but you can still feel it, still hear it. It has taken on a warmer, comforting aspect; a richer, deeper tone. It resonates somewhere down within you, but you shake your head and shut your eyes. The current pulls closer, closer, towards the heart. You drift along with the rest of them. Come now, why do you still try to resist?

  Knowing, low notes fill the air, and a mighty eagle calls to its children. A far cry from their home. Would they even recognise each other?

  Tall, red, Georgian buildings loom over the square. High railings surround the balconies, iron bars cross the thin windows. Smoke-stained and grimy, besmirched with mould, their days of prestige have long since passed. Corinthian stone columns, taken from distant shores, support the bygone institutions, bearing true witness against the legitimacy of history. Such is the narrative of your fallen culture.

  This moment is set beneath a broad chestnut tree at the end of the fall, approaching the winter. Yellowing leaves and spiky green shells are crushed under stiff soles as their siblings watch from the branches in horror. The neglected wooden benches are a favoured spot for lunchtime coffee-drinkers and those without a home. But today, attention is focused not on the comforting, lofty boughs but on the bare stone paving in front, and the creatures moving around upon it.

  Here you are, at last. The nexus of imagination. Stay a while and see.

  People in greys and dull browns gather round the rainbow wonder. You glimpse fur and feathers, crimson and gold and blue and stars. This is a different animal. You manoeuvre against the pulsing, teeming masses to survey the scene.

  You have never seen one in person before. They are preserved in old books and older photographs. To you, they are museum exhibits, combat helicopters, analogies. Their home is the storm-swept plain, the silence of pathless woods. Now here are two of them, solid and spirited. Not just real but vibrant, exaggerated, and in your home town. What business do they have here?

  Culture foreign but nature familiar. Belladonna has such vivid, enticing blooms; the pretty golden poppy adorns the vast Maricopa grasslands, but you must not taste its sap. Look, but don’t be touched.

  Two figures stand together, eyes closed, apparently in a trance. They clutch deliberately crude pipes and rattles as they spin and bob almost imperceptibly. Masses of half-black, half-white feathers crown their heads, long rows of colourful beads hang round their throats. Ancient spirits wind and coil their way down long robes. Mournful cries escape from some secret, hidden place. You blink in disbelief. What melodrama! Your books made no embellishment.

  Tender music gently lulls your spirit in benevolent defiance of your efforts to block it out. A weathered suitcase is propped open on a stool, gaudy bracelets and wooden trinkets within. People poke them about while they judge the rudimentary craftsmanship. How can they value such things? White labels with black marker-pen prices hang from thin strings. You keep your hand firmly on your snakeskin wallet. Relax, you have nothing to fear. Stay, feel the songs, and just see.

  A dozen digital screens are held at arm’s length, capturing both scene and cast. For posterity, naturally; mementos for when they’re gone, as they will, inevitably, be. Keep them within the frame, don’t let them outside the boundaries. Turn on the flash, shoot on sight.

  Painted face and counterfeit hair, a woman stands, cigarette between wrinkled lips, entirely indifferent. She watches, but she does not see. The tobacco burns, and the smoke rises. Others raise flattened, paper-wrapped hamburgers to their mouths, teeth tearing and grinding. A young man with a hollow guitar and scrawny beard taps his foot while his boyfriend sways unconsciously, drawn in by the rhythm. Something shiny in the trunk hooks the attention of the painted woman and she claws at the air towards it, as though her very spirit is yearning. The guitarist steps forward to browse the primitive wooden instruments; perhaps their notes could ignite something new. You start to turn away, when a gleam of sky blue catches your eye.

  Juniper flutes are lifted to lips, soft sounds carry soothing aromas. Wing-bone whistles lament their lost halcyon days of flight. Times change, and time changes. Do not be seduced. Why does the sidewinder shake its tail?

  They are such a long way from their home. Why are they even here? Do they know where they’re going? Are they lost? A large leather bag lies slumped on the ground under the bench behind them. From its enormous size and bulk, it must contain all of their possessions in this world. You could open it up and simply lay bare their lives. Such a heavy burden to carry, such a long way from home.

  The music is coming from inside now. Do you realise that you’re humming?

  The Malaysian boy is here. He waves at you from across the circle. You sleepwalk over and stand vigil with him in silent solidarity. He holds up his blue kazoo, and you take it. Your fingers close around it, keeping it safe.

  You wait a while, watching the few against the many and you sympathise. The sophisticate inspects the preliterate. They gaze at the artefacts like condors over an orphaned calf. This c
ulture is a commodity, its beliefs a fashion statement. You see the shabby box, the tattered, half-opened suitcase. A rattlesnake is painted inside the lid. It is filled with beautiful treasures: carved cottonwood kachina dolls, bone-clay fetishes of Wisakedjak and Nanabozho, rich bison-hide ketohs inlaid with silver and turquoise. How can they price such things? Those people don’t even understand what they’re looking at. They snatch up fistsful of jewellery, brandishing paper offerings in a mock gesture of unrepentant apology. Having slaked their desire at last, one by one they peel off and move on, plunder in hand.

  The wind is blowing and the leaves are falling. My leaves are falling. The reds, the golds, and now even the greens. The lonely darkness is approaching. Forsaken and bereft, I may be, but I shall forever stand with my roots. They have betrayed theirs.

  It is late, and the square is almost empty. I take off the headdress and put it on the floor. We collect up the last of the glass baubles and plastic figures. Off with the stereo. Ominotago closes the suitcase and I fold up the metal table. I riffle through the thick stack of notes; far too much to even count now. I roll them up, snap an elastic band round them and tuck them in the foremost part of my war bonnet. You saw me do it, and yet still you stand and stare. It’s true. We have wandered far from the graves of our ancestors, and without regret. We are everything you perceive us to be, but only because that is what you desire from us. I finish the last of my gingerbread latte and leave the empty cup there on the bench beneath the chestnut tree. Tuketu is here with the Grand Cherokee to spirit us away, in the glory of the sunset.

  ‘Ratkahthos onekwenhtara ehnita, Cetanwakuwa. Nakatew.’

  I swing the leather bag easily onto my shoulder with a well-practised flourish, and hop up into the front seat. The V8 growls. For a moment, you’re caught in the headlights. It’s beginning to rain and you’re alone after all. Dispirited. The chestnut tree is bare and featureless. You open your hand, and in the eerie half-light you stare down at the sky blue kazoo, which starts to get wet.

 

 

  Jonathan Woolgar, Roots

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