Untitled - CSUN ScholarWorks - California State University, Northridge

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42.
the sun.
Near nap time, when the sun had drained the energy
out of all the older people of the neighborhood, they sent
the children to fish at the hole. Both they and the children
knew there were no fish in the hole, but the children still sat
around the brim as quiet as mice with an incredible surge of
patience that kept them quiet so as not to disturb the fish.
One hundred kids accidentally clicking their sticks together
trying to hold them still. The shade of the buildings by that
time of the day hid the kids from the sun. The parents lay
in their beds with their windows open, and like fish they
were lulled to sleep by the quiet noise of sticks quietly
clicking.
Thirsty birds would fly to the hole to bathe and drink.
Thirsty neighborhood cats and dogs that traveled in packs
afraid of children came out of the alleys at night to drink
and rest while the neighborhood went into their apartments
for dinner. The quiet street and the hole slept in the
company of lazy animals under a sunset wind that smelled
like autumn. After dinner, everyone went for one last
nightswim and as a consequence, they began to notice the
stars of the sky again. They reinvented constellations and
astronomy and some made telescopes. They sat out by the
swimming hole, wiping the filth off the sky with their
sweaters, searching the sky for the late summer planets.
They began to understand the cruelty of light pollution and
would tum off all their lights and kept their heads turned,
pretending to be preoccupied in some deep conversation
about galaxies and nebulas, while the children played with
slingshots under the street lamps. When all the lights on the
block had been accidentally shot out, and night had cast
itself over the swimming hole and the attentive
neighborhood population, the stars would shine as bright
as they do in the middle of the ocean.
Nobody remembered the first day of school that year
and they were all at the swimming hole when the bell rang.
Everyone rushed away in panic, grabbing books and
pencils.
The monster had been gone a long time now. Old men
and women with no jobs watered their plants and stared
out their windows at the lonely water hole that was left for