The Midnight Circus, стр. 46

that recitation. But Rachel always knew thatwhen the roll call was done, her mother would start the death-campstories. Whether theaudience wanted to hear them or not, she would surround them with theirown guilt and besiege them with the tales:

HEGELMAN

ISAACS

KAPLAN

KOHN

Hermother had been a child in the camp; had gone through puberty there;had left with her life. Had been lucky. The roll call was of the deadones, the unlucky ones. The children in the camp had each beenimprinted with a portion of the names, a living yahrzeit, little speakingcandles; their eyes burning, their flesh burning, wax in the hands ofthe adults who had told them: “You must remember. If you do notremember, we never lived. Ifyou do not remember, we never died.” And so they remembered.

Rachelwondered if, all over the world, there were survivors, men and womenwho, like her mother, could recite those names:

LEVITZ

MAMOROWITZ

MORGENSTERN

NORENBERG

ORENSTEIN

REESE

Somenights she dreamed of them: hundreds of old children, wizened toddlers,marching toward her, their arms over their heads to show the glowingnumbers, reciting names.

ROSENBLUM

ROSENWASSER

SOLOMON

STEIN

Itwas an epic poem, those names, a ballad in alphabetics. Rachel couldhave recited them along with her mother, but her mouth never moved. Itwas an incantation. Hear, O Israel, Germany, America. The names hadan awful power over her, and even in her dreams she could not speakthem aloud. The stories of the camps, of the choosing of victims—leftline to the ovens right to another day of deadening life—did notfrighten her. She could move away from the group that listened to hermother’s tales. There was no magic in the words that told of mutilations, of children’s brains against the Nazi walls. She couldchoose to listen or not listen; such recitations did not paralyze her.But the names:

TANNENBAUM

TEITLEMAN

VANNENBERG

WASSERMAN

WECHTENSTEIN

ZEISS

Rachelknew that the names had been spoken at the moment of her birth: thather mother, legs spread, the waves of Rachel’s passagerolling down her stomach, had breathed the names between spasms longbefore Rachel’s own namehad been pronounced. Rachel Rebecca Zuckerman. That final Zeiss hadburst from her mother’s lips as Rachel had slipped out greasy with birth blood.Rachel knew she had heard the namesin the womb. They had opened the uterine neck, they had lured her outand beached her as easily as a fish. How often had her mother commentedthat Rachel had never cried as a child. Not once. Not even at birthwhen the doctor had slapped her. She knew, even if her mother did not,that she had been silenced bythe incantation, the Zeiss a stopper in her mouth.

WhenRachel was a child, she had learned the names as another child would a nursery rhyme. Therhythm of the passingsyllables was as water in her mouth, no more than nonsense words. But atfive, beginning to understand the power of the names, she could saythem no more. For the saying was not enough. It did not satisfy hermother’s needs. Rachel knew that there was something more she needed todo to make her mother smile.

Atthirteen, on her birthday, she began menstruating, and her motherwatched her get dressed. “Soplump. So zaftik.” It was an observation, lesspersonal than a weather report.But she knew it meant that her mother had finally seen her as more than an extension, more than achild still red andwhite from its passage intothe light.

Itseemed that, all at once, she knew what to do. Her mother’s duty hadbeen the Word. Rachel’s was to bethe Word Made Flesh.

Shestopped eating.

Thefirst month, fifteen pounds poured off her. Melted. Ran as easily as candle wax. She thought only of food. Bouillon.Lettuce. Carrots. Eggs. Her own private poem. What she missed most was chewing. In the camp they chewed on gristle and wood. It wasone of her mother’s best tales.

Thesecond month her cheekbones emerged, sharp reminders of theskull. She watched themirror and prayed. Barukharah adonai elohenu melekh ha-olam. Shewould not say the words for bread or wine. Too many calories. Too many pounds. Shecut a star out of yellowposter board and held it toher breast. The face in the mirrorsmiled back. She rushed to the bathroom and vomited awayanother few pounds. When she flushed the toilet, the sound was a hiss, as if gas were escaping into theroom. The third month she discovered laxatives, and the names on thecontainers became an addition to her litany: Metamucil, Agoral,Senokot. She could feel the chair impress itself on her bones. Bone on wood. If it hurt to sit, shewould lie down.

Sheopened her eyes and saw the ceiling, spread above her like a sanitizedsky. A voice pronounced her name. “Rachel, Rachel Zuckerman. Answer me.”

Butno words came out. She raised her right hand, a signal; she wasweaker than she thought. Her mother’s face, smiling, appeared. The roomwas full of cries. There was a chill in the air, damp, crowded. The smell of decay was sweet and beckoning. She closed hereyes and the familiar chantbegan, and Rachel added her voice to the rest. It grew stronger near the end:

ABRAHMS

BERLINER

BRODSKY

DANNENBERG

FISCHER

FRANK

GLASSHEIM

GOLDBLATT

HEGELMAN

ISAACS

KAPLAN

KOHN

LEVITZ

MAMOROWITZ

MORGENSTERN

NORENBERG

ORENSTEIN

REESE

ROSENBLUM

ROSENWASSER

SOLOMON

STEIN

TANNENBAUM

TEITLEMAN

VANNENBERG

WASSERMAN

WECHTENSTEIN

ZEISS

ZUCKERMAN

Theysaid the final name together and then, with a little sputter, like a yahrzeitcandle at the end, she went out.

StoryNotes and Poems

TheWeaver of Tomorrow

Thisstory was published in my first book of original fairy tales, TheGirl Who Cried Flowers, that launched my career and landed me withthe title (from Newsweek Magazine) of “America’s Hans ChristianAndersen.” Between Andersen and Oscar Wilde, I had discovered alonging to create new fairy tales. These are stories that walk like andtalk like old tales but are brand new. In other words—not from thefolk, but from a specific author. Though often these stories go backinto the folk culture—“The Little Mermaid,” “Beauty and the Beast,”“The Ugly Duckling,” “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” are popular “folktales,” but each one began as an original story by a specific authorand from there moved out into the world, becoming “folk tales.”

Thepoem below was one I wrote in answer to my friend/co-authorDavid L. Harrison, who had written a poem about a wheel and posted