dEEp Edward

Edward crossed into town along the train track in early spring. Despite what the calendar said, it was dangerously close to summer, when the flowers were pushing up, desperate for a gasp of warm air, but the light was changing patiently, little by little each afternoon. He had left his last inspiration behind, for she no longer got a certain gleam in her eye when he came to call.

Within moments of his arrival, Edward, trusting his impeccable sense of adventure, crossed Lucida’s path. Her songs had just begun to reemerge from winter, and on that day she was looking for a particular word to complete a thought. Having exhausted all possibilities near her home, she was searching in vain in the wood by the river. Edward, being an unappreciated and out of work muse, read her mind and readily produced for her the word she had lost. He approached her slowly and presented the word, laying it softly on the grass in front of her, as if it had grown there. She smiled.

At first, Edward and Lucida formed an uneasy partnership, but once they were sure about each other’s intentions, their connection, like an irrational chemistry, began generating unexpected and unscientific reactions, sometimes producing heat, and sometimes cold too bitter to mention. One early morning, without many words being spoken, the pair packed up their songs and guitar, and set adrift in a paddleboat into the river, not knowing where they were going, or what they would encounter. What follows is Lucida’s account of that journey…

After some time under the rising sun, we saw a woman on the left bank attempting to board an upright piano onto a log raft. She appeared to be a fair and delicate woman, but with a determination that was undaunted by the task. Upon seeing this, Edward and I maneuvered over and lent her our assistance. She asked us where we were going, and we replied that we had not really considered our destination. She said, “Excellent, I happen to be going the same way”. So we tied a line from her raft to our boat as she tied her long red hair back in a knot, satisfied at the completion of the chore. The sun had made considerable progress in the sky, and we took shelter in the shadow of the black shiny upright.

We had just about dozed off when the sound of strings came wafting over the water- I remembered the sirens that had lured Odysseus, and coyly peeked over the edge of the piano. On the bank I saw three soaked figures on a cluster of rocks- my eyes alighted upon the siren-like figure in the middle—a wispy and graceful maiden tempting a cello. On her right was a dashing bright eyed chap with a viola and a de bon aire air. On her left stood a tall and unflinchingly Teutonic man with a violin and flaxen hair blowing in the breeze. We steered our convoy over to greet the trio, who were so intent on their playing that they did not notice us. When they had finished the piece in progress, and their garments had just about dried in the sun, they related the events of their morning. They were having their daily rehearsal on the river when a gust blew their proposed repertoire into the water. As they scrambled to retrieve it, their rowboat capsized, and their oars disappeared downstream in the process. Alas they could not salvage the notes, but managed to save their instruments and swim ashore. They did not, however, allow the mishap to interrupt their scheduled practice, and were soon delighted to discover they did not need notes to play and began inventing the music that drifted by their thoughts. Since they had finished their rehearsal and had no pressing business, the trio thought it more prudent to accept transport in our bustling cluster than to replace the oars with the violin and viola. We hitched the their rowboat to the piano laden log raft, and gave in to the current once again.

The afternoon was glittering on the water, and we decided to steer down the shady side of the river. There were more obstacles to avoid there, but the reprieve from the sun was welcome. When we heard a song coming from over our heads, we expected to catch a glimpse of some rare bird in the trees above, but upon looking up we saw instead a large bellows breathing in and out by the hands of a dark but disarming gypsy man with a half moon smile, sitting in a tire swing. We were just as curious about him as he was about our floating spectacle. After some pleasantries and translations he decided our modest caravan would make a much better place to practice than his precarious perch, and before long, he was lashing his tire to the rowboat, with accordion and another guitar in tow.

As I had mentioned, we were not sure when we would arrive, because we did not really know where we were going. But we did discern the waterway widening ahead. The skies were lowering, and unfortunately we had no useful seafaring knowledge among the characters we had collected. No one said anything when the small peaks be