follies

She loosened the tie that held her dress wrapped tightly around her rib cage. The laces seemed to cut her in half, like a stage prop, like a beaming female assistant: one hand on hip, the other presenting whatever fool act was taking place beside her. Hip to rib cage ratio – what was the golden number? With the dress tied as tightly as it would go, she looked like a 50's pin-up. Rib cage, she thought, sounded like the painting nailed to the wall above her bed. A canary – or was it a parrot – with bright yellow feathers smashed by the door of its own cage, exploding like a confetti bomb. No one knew if it had been caught trying to escape and the door slammed shut in punishment – crushed bones and feathers in return for sought freedom. Or, if it had been mangled by a housecat thanks to a door left ajar by a vengeful domestic contessa – prized possession lost in a moment to one so sly as an orange Tabby called Bates.

Rib cage, she thought, sounded like a printed pillow she once saw at a fair in Aberdeen. Satin pillows stuffed with lavender and tattooed with phrases like “spoiled rotten” “spiteful and delightful”. But there was one pillow, orange as fire, with the black silhouette of a domed birdcage and a bird caught in the sliding door. Stay in the cage, she thought, why risk losing the coveted gift of flight? Even a bird behind bars can hope for another chance to see the earth in ways a spotted deer or sleek cheetah cannot imagine. But a crushed bird--wings broken by desire for elevation and velocity—is reduced to ornament. Safely ensconced in routine and blessed with provincial seeds, her heart and lungs were content to retire all hope of escape.