Water Brother

Thirst always reunites me with my water brother. I have watched him grow, and wrinkle, with me. The others are dead. The laughing dogs ate them. My spear broke under my brother when he fell, and my hands were not strong enough to fight them. I feel tired and strange. My teeth ache. The water is warm and tastes dirty and sad.

The night is a woman’s belly, making fearful children. One of the laughers bit my arm. It drags and feels like it belongs to another. There is heat in my head, singing a confusing song. Soon, I will join the others and rot, or feed the laughers.

What troubles you, water brother? I see dreams in your waking eyes. How ugly you are! There will be no flowers to perfume my decay. Will others gather them for you?

We should not have walked this way, but night voices whispered to my sister. Their cunning words made her believe that there was food here, easily taken. Lies are common at night, but she was like a heavy stone in her resolve. How I wish that she had not fallen, water brother! She could tell which plants nourish and which kill. She spoke with fire so sweetly that it burned all night with little fuel, simply to watch her sleep or listen to her soft songs. I am clumsy and do not understand the tricks of fire. How cold I will be without her, until I rot.

Oh, water brother, you may be the only one to remember me. Do not forget how quick and clever I was when hunting, or how I protected my sister and brothers from danger. Remember how the women chattered about my swiftness, and how the voices of the night sang for me when we entered the circle of strange stones deep in the cave to the north, letting everyone know that a special blessing was mine. I was sure I would find a woman to make my nights warm after that.

No one has looked at me that way. We are bound together by the cord of our ugliness, water brother! Is it long enough to let you follow me into the breathless dark, where the dead gather? Nothing can frighten the dead. We will be safe there, you and I.