Grandfather’s garden, leaf-strewn and haggard in the autumn cold, sports many odd sculpture figures, none so engaging as this writhing griffon sculpted from black marble as if from life.
At dusk, this particular macabre sculpture seems to come alive. Its eyes shine. Its smooth skin undulates in the chilly moonlight. Sometimes, like now, I feel its goose bumps form as if they are my own.
This evening, I am resting from a day’s work cleaning up the garden and the adjacent family cemetery with its iron rectangular enclosure over there behind the gate. I have worked hard all day since dawn. I am sweaty and dirty. I ache all over from raking, delving, weeding, walking, bending and rising, crouching, carrying, and blistering and scratching both my hands. Do you see the pile of brambles by the wall? That is the midden of this year’s haul, laid on the decaying compost of past hauls going back ages.
I owe this annual ritual of manual labor to my forebears who have been interred here for five generations, every root and branch of the family tree. The gravestones in the cemetery are askew because of the watery ground and many winters’ groundswells and heaving.
In New England, every garden has its crop of rocks, and that goes double for cemeteries. Nature is always trying to reclaim her own. She lays her hand on your soul and does her best to pull you down beside her.
In this rich black earth, life will grow in green profusion, then crisp up and finally return to somewhere like this darkening place. Eastern worm snakes will coil around the buried bones or dart up from sunken tombs, then wiggle down again like pink ropes whipping back and forth through cracks in the stone. Who knows the dead as intimately as silent feeding worms and microscopic all-engulfing bacteria?
Grandfather brought me here each year when I was little. He taught me how to tend this garden and cemetery, which became his final resting place. He told me stories that made my hair stand on end. He told of the family’s hardships, betrayals, even murders. He laughed when I said I was afraid.
At least once each year, he would silently sneak up behind me when I was in reverie. He would take his glove off his rough hand and hold it to a cold pipe. Then he would grab me by the nape of my neck just to see me jump with fright. I did not disappoint him. He said that was good training for the time when Death himself would come to take me home.
I was there when Grandfather passed. I saw him tremble right at the end as if a cold, resolute hand had grabbed him by the neck. Whenever I am in this place, I feel so close to Grandfather, I could almost cry. But I do not cry because grown-up women do not cry. I hear Grandfather’s voice say that so clearly this evening. He is listening to us now. He knows why I conjured you. Can you hear him? No?
Just there, inside the gate, you can see the grave of my Aunt Matilda, the in-law who, according to Grandfather, poisoned my Uncle Clem to get his money. From her epitaph, you would hardly believe she was a witch. Her stone reads, “Here Lies Patience, Patiently Waiting for the Lord.”
I watched her here by moonlight gather the fatal berries that ended my uncle’s life. I saw her mash the black, deadly nightshade in the kitchen and mix the berries’ juice with Uncle Clem’s drink night after night until he died. I never saw her ride on a broom or gather newts’ eyes, but I know what she was.
Now, she lies there beside my uncle, grave by grave, prim and proper. She was laid out like a bride for the coming of the Lord. Grandfather figured it was a good thing she was buried in an asphalt coffin to protect her from the flames of Hell. He said the longer Apocalypse waited, the better for a great many of my ancestors, himself included.
Back by the wall, you can find Great-Great-Great Grandfather, who, Grandfather claimed, took the life of the farmer whose land lay adjacent to ours. After he had done the violent deed one foggy, ill-starred night, he married that farmer’s daughter although she knew the truth. Grandfather told me the farmer’s daughter, his Great-Great Grandmother, finally got her revenge. She waited until her husband was too weak from age and drink to rise. She then smothered him with a laced pillow. She lies there by his side as if nothing amiss had ever happened.
That entire farmer’s land is now in the family’s estate. Just now, if you listen, you can hear the lowing of the herd coming to the barn to spend the night. I hear the lowing of herds that stretch back generations. I see the white from their breathing in the cold. Do you see them breathing in their long file? No?
Do you see the stone mausoleum in the center of the cemetery? That’s the place of Grandfather and Grandmother’s tombs. I took special care to clear the overgrowth from the little house without furniture. I could not do much with the thick moss and lichen. There is no way to mask the unmistakable smells of dank, rotting earth and the peculiarly human stench of graves.
I cried when my brothers brought Grandfather here that final time. When they interred him, I thought I heard him tell me to come to visit, often. Grandmother and I never had the bond that I had with my Grandfather, and she deeply resented it. There was nothing she could do, and it rankled her right up to her own death.
Grandmother’s internment did not affect me at all, except I felt relieved. Grandmother had been an unhappy woman all her life. She had made life miserable for Grandfather, though he did everything he could to make her happy. When I get near their mausoleum, I can feel the shades of those two tugging at me on both sides of my mind. I shiver to think of their invisible hands on either beating half of my pounding heart.
Come with me now and let us light the torch. It is time. Watch your step as the very ground will take you down, or a stone, a stray branch, or a gnarled root. See how the statue’s eyes watch and flicker in the firelight. Walk around it with me. See how its scales ripple and how its body undulates. Look at the way its sharp eyes follow us. We’re not alone. Don’t laugh at me! You are always smiling.
Now look toward the mausoleum. See how the firelight throws the shadow of the griffon against the mausoleum’s wall? It darts and rises with the flickering. The wild, flickering fire lends the marble life. I have often dreamed that one night, like tonight, Grandfather would come to me, as he always did, and grab me on the nape of the neck with his cold, rough hand.
I fancy that I would then turn, like so. He’d then laugh and shake his finger, so. No, your hand is warm, not cold like his. Your lips are warm. I like the feel of your arms around me. I like the feel of your breath on my ear. You’re nothing like Grandfather. You’re nothing like Grandfather’s descriptions of you. I thrill in your embrace. We are meant for each other.
Yes, the griffon is pointing to the mausoleum. So are you. Yes, I will go with you to visit the little house. Will you help me with the heavy door? Will you go inside with me? Will you hold the torch so we can see the tombs? Will you lie with me on the cold, crypt floor? Will we mock the scourge of life with all our might and vigor? Yes, I know we will. Yes, I know you well enough.
The ground is uneven. Watch your step. The gate is heavy, but today I oiled the hinges. We will not make such squealing noises as will wake the dead. I also prepared the mausoleum door as best I could without you. Yes, I will take your hand, which now is cold and rough. You have to promise not to smile so when we are inside. I do not intend for us a comical interlude.
I waited for you this long. Be patient with me now as I prepare. How sad I am to be caught so rough and bleeding from my chores. How ready, even so, am I for your embrace? Now we are inside. How narrow and cramped is this little house? See Grandfather’s tomb there, and Grandmother’s tomb there beside him on the floor? There is space enough for us. I shall lie here above Grandfather. You shall lie there above Grandmother. The torch has extinguished. Not to worry. I have your hand. Now descend and lie with me. Now fold me in your arms, so. Yes. Though I cannot see you, I can feel you all around me.
I know you are smiling. I do not mind. I do not mind at all. Your perpetual smile reminds me of what I am. I will now begin to laugh a little with you in this cold, damp place. I feel your arms and your cold hand all along my body. I understand you now. I am yours alone. I will sleep in your arms until we awaken. I have found peace at last. Grandfather, is it really you? Please say something. Ah, your cold hand startled me. Yes.