August 21, 2008
THE STAR
| BARTH ANDERSON |
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You’re a seeker, or you wouldn’t be here. I just hope you know what you’re seeking, and I hope it’s not the future. Diviners of old never “foretold,” because they, like me, were outside of time. Diviners of old used their chicken bones and tea leaves to map people’s fortune—the bitter glory waiting, waiting to be born in them—not future details of a mournful life. What will happen tomorrow? And tomorrow? And tomorrow? Will I be rich? Healthy? Will I get the lover or the car that I seek? No, no, no. Those are the noodlings of a bored shopkeeper, not a diviner.
Are you seeking answers about the future? Or are you divining? Because I’ll tell you this—you are coming closer and closer to where I dwell, outside of time. In fact, with each word that you read in this sentence, you edge closer to what you seek—your fortune—and when you find it, whether you know it or not, you’ll be out of time.
I know that you’re a diviner because you drew The Star. Or you selected this tarot card deliberately. Are you following The Star? I think it might be following you. Watery sunlight was falling on a bank of wet peony bushes, and on each damp leaf, was the winking of a tiny star. Maybe you failed to notice them, or the cop’s silver badge. How about the open, starfish hand of that kid who was begging? Or that Texas license plate? That label on the bottle of Mogen David? Superstars and stars upon thars and gold stars and spangled banners—every single one of fifty a hint, a wink, a reminder.
The sentences are flowing by, now. You’re getting so close.
Diviners like you came looking for a child, following their fortune over many, many miles to Bethlehem. Perhaps the whole world might have become a better place if they’d ended that myth right there, when divinity was still just an infant, not a political torture victim whose bloody death no one could stop. Maybe we would still feel that starry-eyed awe, if we thought God was sweet, helpless, needed to nurse. A myth reminding us to mother instead of mourn.
Do you know what you’re looking for? Is that baby following you? Are you following the baby? Doesn’t matter. You’re getting closer.
Closer.
Closer.
Closer.
Barth Anderson’s fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld Magazine, Asimov’s, Strange Horizons, Weird Tales, Polyphony, and elsewhere. His new novel The Magician and The Fool (Bantam Spectra) is a surreal thriller about the world’s oldest tarot deck. Learn more at www.barthanderson.com.
Myka said,
May 2, 2009 at 12:36 am
that was interesting. Who are you? I don’t really understand this website yet.