Goose

Trailing her father, bearing his hand axe, the girl thought she had never guessed what earthly majesty was before then, as he strode unconcernedly holding a vicious gander by the horny mitts and let the big wings batter his knees. She was also surprised to feel a liberating satisfaction in the coming bloodshed, and that notwithstanding all the times she had been beleaguered and had fled, today she did not fear the barnyard hubub. Yet, as her father’s clever stroke fell, as the pronged head skipped sideways and the neck plumes stiffened with blood from the cleft, she was angry; and, when the headless goose ran to the brook and was carried off into the woods alive, she rejoiced, and subsequently frequented those woods and avoided her father. When the goose began to mend she brought him small hominy, which was welcome though she had to press the kernels one by one into the pink neck that throbbed into her palm; when haemorrhage occurred she would not spare handkerchiefs, and stanching the spot she felt a thrill of sympathy. But for the most part there was steady progress, and growing vigor was accompanied by restlessness, and one cool day the blind thing was batted out of existence by a motorcycle. She had no time for tears. She ran upstairs to miss her father’s barytone commiseration, then out onto the fields, and, holding an old red pinwheel, ran ran ran ran.