of my body that is cursed. This is an evolution-ary trick. My left ear has acquired dog hearing, and the rest of me must catch up. I cannot sleep. I paint to pass the time, the daffodils outside the kitchen window, half-remembered horses from old oil paintings -- were the paintings genuine, or were they knock-offs from Chinatown? My friends say Chinatown food is terrible, because it is not authentic, but I say, As long as it's good, who cares? But I am a monster for saying that. My five-year old son looks at some of my paintings. What do you think? I ask him. He grabs hold of my bony arm -- I have lost much weight due to lack of sleep -- and he says with great seriousness, Are you okay, Mommy? And with that I realize that he hates the paintings, that he thinks I have no talent, that my attempt at artistry is an affront, because otherwise he would say something, and instead he is making a vague comment about my health to hide this calamity.
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There was no time. The enemy was like a great wave, very natural, flooding down the hills in clumps, nothing symmetric about them. Fighting had gone on for some time, with many lost on all sides, so not all of them had guns. They carried club-like substitute weapons, knives, hatchets, torches. And now they were here, and the villagers were told: You have one hour to leave. That as all, no conditionals, no or else. Those who could gather food and clothes did -- the rest only stared helplessly at their thatched roofs, their floors of dust and burned bits of twig. And on the hour, the enemy set fire to everything, many of the villagers giving up right at that point, sitting and watching the flames creep toward them, even gazing incuriously as their limbs ignited, and then they were screaming, but this was not their pain, not even their voices, this was just the act of a spirit escaping, or at least
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