Their Early Years

Once when we were on a bus between some cities we discussed the things

that happened in their early years. Their youngest time was spent alone

while living with an uncle only half remaining from a foreign war. His

upper half was wel enough, but in the pants between his cuffs where his

zipper stopped, his legs were gone. And so he rolled around on wheels,

self sufficient in a peeling little house he could not paint again. But it

was spotless to the point of two feet above the floor and warmth was in

his laugh and in his smiling face. The people that they met were few and

might have been disturbed by two who looked so strange, but they were not

aware. For living with their stumpy uncle, who was unconcerned and

rumpled, made them see things differently. They thought that we were put

together randomly, just like the weather, with no uniformity in mind. But

that vision only lasted for a while until he passed away and they were

sent off to a home. The children there did not have parents, were all

alike and always staring, as they sat on chairs above the ground. So they

cried and then with drew fromhose that shouted, laughed and who were mean

because of suffering inside. Once alone they heard some children shouting

that a car had killed one of their pets out in the road ahead. As they

approached the fallen body, blood appeared and then they saw a leg that

had been torn away somehow. So they kneeled upon the ground and lifted up

the leg they found and wedged it gently just below the spot where both

their shoulders joined together. Then the sun, which had been setting,

winked and for a moment all was dark. And when the sun returned above

them, no one laughed and made fun of them, for the dog was licking at the

joint, barking loud and resurrected and causing them to be respected by

those who had avoided them before.