Behind the Falling Window
By: Emmanuelle Nikolaev
I am the moth. I am the rot. I am the beetles in the cracks. I am the spiders and their
silk. I am all the dark things. My brother is the light through the window. He is the air, he is
the floating dust. He is the moss, he is the water on the wall, he is the shattered mirror in the
blinding sunlight. We are the bones, lying in the corner, cold, old, bones, tired old bones in
this room whose walls never shift, but we sink deeper every year into our Mother Earth, our
only God, for all others were buried with us in this tower, and no one remembers to visit
these old bones.
The raven calls to us, its squawking piercing our ears. I wonder how long it has
been. I wonder how many ravens have lived and died as we loiter here. I wonder how many
centuries I have been the shattered mirror, how many years I have been the ash from the
candle. I wonder how long forever is, I wonder if they will remember my name, even as I
do not. My brother wonders too, he wonders how long he has been the water, how long he
has been unfiltered swelter lands. We are not the pretty carcasses for your museums, we are
a hundred years of wandering, we are the kinslain, the unrestful dead, killed for a crown that
fell off his head when he donned it, our last warrior king.
Sing to me
My brother cries in the wind of the room, if my voice is sweet enough they may
bury us. If the sound is shrill enough they will have to bury us. I sing into the quiet, I sing a
song, something about a fox and a town. They still sing it, out in that loud clattering world,
but I would never hear it from another’s lips.
She hears the sound at the top of the tower, spiraling down like so many dandelions.
She looks up into the eye of that unfathomable darkness, her foot on the cold damp stare, for
the sound is a voice and it comes so sharply through the empty wind.
I sing until my voice is raw, until I may be dead again, and then I hear the steps, the
gentle echo of salvation climbing this stone tower of ours. Hope that beloved foreigner
comes to rest upon my chest, even as it is only dust. I wake my slumbering brother, I yell to
him and we sing anew our voices chasing each other in some frantic melody. We run out of
hymns in our haste, instead singing in melodies our minds made new, singing, for these cold
bones want to be buried.
She climbs the stairs, faster and faster as the singing renews harder and harder comes
the pounding of the rhythm, like the thumping of a great jackrabbit heart. She trips once,
her hands scraping the stones, blood seeping into the unflinching stones, rust red and
Catholic carmine marking the very spot when we were remembered.
My many legs are frantic, I scuttle across the floor, adding to the clamor. My brother
makes the wind join our chorus, thrashing again and again against the tower until the stones
begin to fracture beneath our very bones, this sinking window shedding the crumbling
fragments of centuries-old stones. We are the roiling of the sea, the brutality of the old
country’s whisper of salvation, sing oh island nation, sing of your unfurling, scream your salt, till
it all goes bent like merchant wood.
She reaches the top of the stairs, the wind lashing her face as if it were some carrion
seabird, desperate for the final word. In front of her lies the door, the door to us, the door to
our memories, the door that stands between us and the great expanse of the world.
She presses into the louding room, a million beetles, spiders, and ants crawling on the
floor, the cracked mirror stands beside the roiling mound, reflecting her face in a million
shards. At once the mass disperses, and the wind becomes quiet and kind, she steps through
the door, her face wild with the wind and chase.
We call to her, our shouts those of a dying man to a God’s lovely respite, his very last
breath given to the mercy. She looks down at our ivory selves, her eyes wide with the truth
of us. There are gnarled velvet tatters around our un-bodies, the last vestments of the wealth
before the starving.
She comes to us, her hands martyrs to the horror of our cold old bones,
Bury us
We whisper, we plead
She stands, we hear the stretching of her living bones.
Bury us
We agonize in tandem.
Bury us
She takes us, our cold, old bones, from this chamber that has been us for centuries.
We are no longer the rot, no longer the wind, just these cold, old bones.
She walks down the stairway, descending to the dread god’s domain, down to the
deep and the damp. The bones chatter, they want to be free.
The sky, we see the sky, we see the clouds, we see the sun in full, we see all of it.
Her feet meet the road, let on by the gods of wanting, by the gods of the million eyes
alighting on her blankness, on her arms, heavy with the burden of centuries, upon centuries,
upon centuries. With the burden of all our abandoned heart-weary years, blind moths to the
promised light.
She reaches the garden, kneeling to the ground, breaking it, marking it with her
bloody scraped hands.
We smell the dirt, we smell the flowers, we smell the world, we are everything.
She presses us into the Mother Earth, our once and future return.
We become the cool darkness of the sea, of the sky, of terra beloved.
We are buried.
These cold, old bones begin to rest.
silk. I am all the dark things. My brother is the light through the window. He is the air, he is
the floating dust. He is the moss, he is the water on the wall, he is the shattered mirror in the
blinding sunlight. We are the bones, lying in the corner, cold, old, bones, tired old bones in
this room whose walls never shift, but we sink deeper every year into our Mother Earth, our
only God, for all others were buried with us in this tower, and no one remembers to visit
these old bones.
The raven calls to us, its squawking piercing our ears. I wonder how long it has
been. I wonder how many ravens have lived and died as we loiter here. I wonder how many
centuries I have been the shattered mirror, how many years I have been the ash from the
candle. I wonder how long forever is, I wonder if they will remember my name, even as I
do not. My brother wonders too, he wonders how long he has been the water, how long he
has been unfiltered swelter lands. We are not the pretty carcasses for your museums, we are
a hundred years of wandering, we are the kinslain, the unrestful dead, killed for a crown that
fell off his head when he donned it, our last warrior king.
Sing to me
My brother cries in the wind of the room, if my voice is sweet enough they may
bury us. If the sound is shrill enough they will have to bury us. I sing into the quiet, I sing a
song, something about a fox and a town. They still sing it, out in that loud clattering world,
but I would never hear it from another’s lips.
She hears the sound at the top of the tower, spiraling down like so many dandelions.
She looks up into the eye of that unfathomable darkness, her foot on the cold damp stare, for
the sound is a voice and it comes so sharply through the empty wind.
I sing until my voice is raw, until I may be dead again, and then I hear the steps, the
gentle echo of salvation climbing this stone tower of ours. Hope that beloved foreigner
comes to rest upon my chest, even as it is only dust. I wake my slumbering brother, I yell to
him and we sing anew our voices chasing each other in some frantic melody. We run out of
hymns in our haste, instead singing in melodies our minds made new, singing, for these cold
bones want to be buried.
She climbs the stairs, faster and faster as the singing renews harder and harder comes
the pounding of the rhythm, like the thumping of a great jackrabbit heart. She trips once,
her hands scraping the stones, blood seeping into the unflinching stones, rust red and
Catholic carmine marking the very spot when we were remembered.
My many legs are frantic, I scuttle across the floor, adding to the clamor. My brother
makes the wind join our chorus, thrashing again and again against the tower until the stones
begin to fracture beneath our very bones, this sinking window shedding the crumbling
fragments of centuries-old stones. We are the roiling of the sea, the brutality of the old
country’s whisper of salvation, sing oh island nation, sing of your unfurling, scream your salt, till
it all goes bent like merchant wood.
She reaches the top of the stairs, the wind lashing her face as if it were some carrion
seabird, desperate for the final word. In front of her lies the door, the door to us, the door to
our memories, the door that stands between us and the great expanse of the world.
She presses into the louding room, a million beetles, spiders, and ants crawling on the
floor, the cracked mirror stands beside the roiling mound, reflecting her face in a million
shards. At once the mass disperses, and the wind becomes quiet and kind, she steps through
the door, her face wild with the wind and chase.
We call to her, our shouts those of a dying man to a God’s lovely respite, his very last
breath given to the mercy. She looks down at our ivory selves, her eyes wide with the truth
of us. There are gnarled velvet tatters around our un-bodies, the last vestments of the wealth
before the starving.
She comes to us, her hands martyrs to the horror of our cold old bones,
Bury us
We whisper, we plead
She stands, we hear the stretching of her living bones.
Bury us
We agonize in tandem.
Bury us
She takes us, our cold, old bones, from this chamber that has been us for centuries.
We are no longer the rot, no longer the wind, just these cold, old bones.
She walks down the stairway, descending to the dread god’s domain, down to the
deep and the damp. The bones chatter, they want to be free.
The sky, we see the sky, we see the clouds, we see the sun in full, we see all of it.
Her feet meet the road, let on by the gods of wanting, by the gods of the million eyes
alighting on her blankness, on her arms, heavy with the burden of centuries, upon centuries,
upon centuries. With the burden of all our abandoned heart-weary years, blind moths to the
promised light.
She reaches the garden, kneeling to the ground, breaking it, marking it with her
bloody scraped hands.
We smell the dirt, we smell the flowers, we smell the world, we are everything.
She presses us into the Mother Earth, our once and future return.
We become the cool darkness of the sea, of the sky, of terra beloved.
We are buried.
These cold, old bones begin to rest.
Writer's Statement: This piece follows the deposed child-King Edward V of England and his younger brother Prince Richard of Shrewsbury as their spirits remain trapped in the Tower of London. This is a story about finally being heard, and the ability of a stranger's capacity for human kindness to overcome an overwhelming feeling of being trapped.