Shhhh, quiet, do you hear it? (it’s dark here and this darkness spins in my ears and eyes, the walls are squeaking and drooling on the floor, the sounds of hundreds of wet steps and whirlpools and stars in the corners, they watch when I turn my gaze away, you have to take care of him, that’s what mama told me) and do you remember how she used to sing to us? the song about the king and the dog? (there are only black tendrils here holding my eyelids and tongue. and everywhere these rats and their hairy tails. my ankles are all bitten up, but I bite them too.

I count the bitten-off tails. I do it when my mouth gets dry. thirty-one tails already, one, two, three) you're too loud, I told you already, caves mock, quiet now, come on, if you're quiet it won’t come. (he’s afraid of his hands with fingers like reeds) like the ones we saw last summer by the pond, where we caught crayfish. grandma cooked them later in water with dill, remember? you licked the whole plate clean. (in the walls live angular faces with eyes like saucers, I close my eyes, but they’re still there, I feel their laughter on my cheeks) what are you talking about? I’m just sitting and catching rats, I’ll cook them in dill water just like our dear grandma and you’ll feast on them. no, don’t cry, I don’t like it when you cry, if you want I’ll tell that story about the princess and the mouse but shhhh now, you’ll see it’ll be just like before the melody, before the rat-plague and before all the cats in town died.

(I hear how the echo brings fear and croaking like all frogs and crows and tomcats in heat screaming, like creaking doors in our church and like scraping a fork on a plate. fingernail on a chalkboard. and the howling of a limping dog) you're babbling, whining like a little brat. if you keep talking like that he’ll come soon, and you’ll scream and scream (he had hands down to the ground and a holey hat with a brim so wide his face was darkness thick like molasses and December mud. the voice booms from a well) oh I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you, come here, I’ll lull you (he’s light as a feather, sharp edges and eyes like saucers, cobwebs and greasy bugs like the ones we saw in the belly of that dead pigeon. don’t twist your face like that, you were the one who wanted to poke it with a stick and turn it over. (they still scream at me silently from all the walls, mumbling with their mouths, opening them and shoving in their fingers, I have nothing at all but thirty-one tails, one, two, three).

I’m not sleeping, not at all, want me to tell you that story about the page and the cat? the one mama used to sing to us? but you have to be very quiet, quiet as a little mouse, do you promise? yes yes, I promise, alright then, how did it go (hey do you hear?) shhhhh, quiet, do you hear? close your eyes, cover your ears and not a squeak, little mouse.

Inga BORÓWA Borówka