University of Northern Iowa

The MenagerieAuthor(s): Harold BondSource: The North American Review, Vol. 253, No. 3 (May - Jun., 1968), p. 28Published by: University of Northern IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25116788 .

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handles and arrowheads worth a great deal of money and was thus able to tell the company to shove it, which he did. "Shove it," he told them.

And then ... his bankroll restored, and also his considerable pride, Jay was faced with the choice of 1 ) going on to South America proper and continuing on his merry way, or 2) returning to his wife and job in New York.

But then ... a third choice was made for him, and it was a choice he would always remember, in his fif

ties, and sixties, and seventies, on those mornings when he waked up with a smile of secrecy and a lifted brow of remembered amazement and a warm glow all over and not a little yearning for his lost youth. He went

swimming in the ocean to think about things, only he went in the buff and he went in shark-infested waters.

And then . . . the sharks left him alone, but he was

dragged out and dried off by some men in unpressed green coats carrying straight white jackets and hypo dermic needles and placed in an isolated and padded

cell for observation. He flunked the observer test, which was to sit calmly with no show of emotion for twelve hours, really not so long. Jay however, to

break even this monotony, started reliving and rehears

ing in his mind all the many adventures he had had so

far so he wouldn't forget them in his declining years. He also started planning his course of action in South America.

"All you swingers down there in Brazil, watch out!"

he said once during the twelve hours. "Jordan is

spreading out!" With all the many and wondrous things going on in

his busy mind, he smiled a lot during his observation, once or twice even showing his gleaming teeth.

But then ... he was removed from the cell and giv en a series of 24 high voltage electric shocks, com

pletely destroying his speech and his memory forever, but preserving forever the smile and the lifted brow of

amazement and the warm glow all over.

And then . . .

DREAMSIDE BESTIARY

Home has been a tree-house all

along, I find, somewhere off in the woods. Going there, I say

to myself, why have I not before thought of it

in that perspective. At the dream's edge,

later, I turn. I hear them, first, the raccoon, his

paws frisking the room like shovels, then the girl, the tall, beautiful

albino girl who follows the raccoon, her milk-white skin

and silver, shoulder-length hair

dazzling the room. Her intention becomes apparent:

to order the animal's

rummaging, the stove, breadbox, bureau drawers spilled open,

knowing, in fact, the precise position of each

rummaged item. When the animal stops, he sees me in her light, and

as I see him, a fox

now, he turns from the girl, sidling

back to the furthest corner

of the room. The girl nods yes and yes, her pink eyes like suns.

And the raccoon, later a fox, breathes deep in his heat,

witnessing the silences between them.

THE MENAGERIE

You say you know me. I am the one

who appears suddenly at parties. When I am late, which I am always,

you cry procrastinator, and flap your ears like any old basset hound.

Your jellyfish women take my hand,

feeling the hoofed fingers stuck with glue. In our various wars of attrition,

you come paddling up your Rubicon

with nothing but a jackass' jaw to lay me under. You cry stopgap over the potatoes I have dropped,

the fumbled passes, the killed Smalltalk. And when I huddle in some corner

and hunch my shoulders against your clear

plastic tombstones for warmth, sir, you cry

schizophrenic. I am your burlap bag of glue, your palomino frothing

at the mouth. You carry me around

with you always. Do you understand me?

Say it. You understand perfectly.

Harold Bond

HAROLD BOND lives in Boston. Jie has published in The

New Yorker, Harper's, Saturday Review, and elsewhere, and

is a former member of the Writers Workshop at The Uni

versity of Iowa.

28 The North American Review

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