An Early Parable of Words Made Flesh
On the cusp of language, a grandchild says baboo for moon. Gau-gau means dog, Santa, a blue car—elasticity here no less remarkable than a good metaphor, like the word flower, which may also mean a mouth poised to open in a lone woman, or equally lone man. Jeece means juice or spilled milk, and goblish means anything, or everything—a warm stew, the thickened pottage of daily life. A child teaches any clump of sounds will suffice, that words are effortless, and one is to fifty and flower is to moon. Adam, so the old story goes, in his early first tongue named aardvark, elephant, cobra, and all other animals, and like an innocent knew his wife as Eve, the Mother of All Living, a flower that smelled of musk and twilight the moment he reached to her beneath the baboo moon, the moment they kissed and their lives became a mess of goblish.
Douglas L. Talley is the author of the poetry collection, Adam's Dream (Parables Publishing 2011). His work has appeared in The American Scholar, Cimarron Review, and other journals and anthologies.
Art by Anne French.
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Great set up to deliver that last line.