Going Wrong

The fish are dreadful. They are brought up the mountain in the dawn most days, beautiful and alien and cold from night under the sea, the grand rooms fading from their flat eyes. Soft machinery of the dark, the man thinks, washing them. "What can you know of my machinery!" demands the Lord. Sure, the man says quietly and cuts into them, laying back the dozen struts, getting to the muck of something terrible. The Lord insists: "You are the one who chooses to live this way. I build cities where things are human. I make Tuscany and you go to live with rock and silence." The man washes away the blood and arranges the fish on a big plate. Starts the onions in the hot olive oil and puts in peppers. "You have lived all year without women." He takes out everything and puts in the fish. "No one knows where you are. People forget you. You are vain and stubborn." The man slices tomatoes and lemons. Takes out the fish and scrambles eggs. I am not stubborn, he thinks, laying all of it on the table in the courtyard full of early sun, shadows of swallows flying on the food. Not stubborn, just greedy.