The 21st century gives everyone access to the black mirrors that hold every ounce of information imaginable: in our pockets, on our walls, on our desks, in our purses, and our classrooms. Because of this, it is essential to consider the fate of the library institution. For those of us who grew up in a childhood sans the Internet, there was once a time when you went to the library in search of answers within the binding of physical books. With little direction, pulling and parsing through every nook and cranny of encyclopedias, dictionaries, and anthologies, the sought-after nugget of information was finally revealed. Then, it was down the rabbit hole. With the advent of the digital era, those old ways of library marathon hunts are now times of antiquity. Those exact black mirrors are now our answers, keys, guideposts leading the way to information.

In recent years, libraries' future and fate have been in flux. Many scholars, researchers, and current librarians have been in conversation about what this may look like:

• Are libraries entirely online without physical print copies, or are they hybrid?

• Can and will libraries adapt to new technologies? Is research at risk because of this?

• Are librarians optimistic or pessimistic about their future in the digital era?

The crux of these questions surrounds the fate of the library institution, with one side favoring the innovation potential of libraries in the digital age and those impartial, with some remaining ambivalent. In “The Future of Reading and Academic Libraries,” David M. Durant and Tony Horava discuss the implications of switching from print to digital publications and libraries’ responsibility to maintain the institution's integrity by implementing hybrid collections. To them, physical and electronic books are “complementary, not interchangeable,” pointing to optimism for libraries’ future and their malleability (5). Meanwhile, Marlene Manoff’s approach is much more nuanced in “Human and Machine Entanglement in the Digital Archive: Academic Libraries and Socio-Technical Change.” To her, digitizing archives has both faults and strengths. For one, researchers must adapt to the changing landscape, but two, they must practice discretion. Without discretion, the risk of perpetuating confirmation biases and echo chambers runs rampant because of algorithmic preferences. Therein lies the nuance. As for the overall feelings and sentiments surrounding this topic, Andrew M. Cox et al. explore the data after interviewing library stakeholders in “Academic Libraries’ Stance toward the Future.” By asking the stakeholders their explicit thoughts and feelings, the data shows how the consensus varies, reflecting the overall questioning tone: to adapt or not to adapt?

David M. Durant and Tony Horava consider the potential of libraries to be bookless, that is, entirely without print copies, and the possible success or failure of such a move. With the rise of e-readers, such as Kindle and Nook, and the prevalence of computers, laptops, smartphones, and digital libraries, “it is no exaggeration to say that the reading experience has been profoundly affected by the shift in media” (Durant and Horava 7). In “The Future of Reading and Academic and Academic Libraries,” Durant and Horava outline critical factors in the developing trend toward digital libraries:

“One key advantage of electronic information resources over print is that simultaneous users can access them regardless of location or time of day. In the age of Google, many users do not expect to come to the library at all. Electronic access to information also allows libraries to save space by reducing the size of their print holdings, thus enabling them to add more computers, study space, and amenities such as coffee shops to attract students to the library as a physical space…Finally, electronic information resources have enabled libraries to expand their holdings…well beyond what they owned in tangible format” (6).

On the other hand, Durant and Horava utilize data from a 2009 study at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) about the difference between reading from a digital page and a print page. The research found that reading text in physical form vs Web form stimulates different areas of the brain associated with language and visual ability, as well as “controlling decision making and pattern analysis,” respectively (9). Research shows that “people reading in digital format are far more likely to engage in a form of superficial ‘power browsing’ or skimming than they are to read in depth” (Durant and Horava 9). Durant and Horava’s solution is for libraries to adapt to the time “and focus on maintaining hybrid collections, containing both print and digital materials” and realizing that “print and digital are distinct yet complementary formats, each serving a different type of user need” (17).

Marlene Manoff’s “Human and Machine Entanglement in the Digital Archive: Academic Libraries and Socio-Technical Change” urges a more nuanced approach to understanding how we use and adopt new technologies and digital archives. Online research tools run the risk of enabling researchers to participate in an echo chamber because the machines and software we use rely on algorithmic codes. These codes are designed to show what the algorithm thinks we are looking for. This supports a negative feedback loop entangled with our prior understanding and does not support changes in belief. Thus aligning with confirmation biases.

One solution she proposes is for librarians to “design and build their own discovery tools involving students, scholars, and technologists in the process. They could exercise more control…and if librarians built their own tools, they would have a much better sense of their strengths and limitations” (522.) By investigating today’s environment of technological advancement in academic libraries, there would be a deeper understanding of the needs of scholars.

All three authors believe that researchers and librarians “must adapt to the tools available, whether they are card catalogs, printed book indexes, online library catalogs, full-text databases, or search engines like Google” (Manoff 517). They are also in agreeance that libraries “should include a commitment to [maintaining] some level of open-stack access to print monographs to provide users with access to the benefits of print reading and research, including serendipitous browsing” (17). At the heart of their agreement lies the library's core values to promote reading, equitable research, a place to discover new ideas, and a place of solitude for students to reflect. Andrew M. Cox et al. surveyed a set of “stakeholders both within and beyond the library community” to gain insight into the overall feeling for the future of libraries and their imminent adaptation to it. Overall, the “survey reflected ambivalence about the future,” and “some participants emphasized fundamental continuity; others felt a sense of continuous change. Some felt pessimistic about the future, others optimistic” (Cox et al. 494).

Durant, Horava, and Manoff disagree, though, in the implementation of their visions. Where Durant and Horava encourage a hybrid print and digital model for libraries, Manoff’s argument focuses more on discovery tools, such as a search engine, designed strictly by librarians. To Durant and Horava, what is essential is maintaining the integrity of the library’s core values in their ideal that they call the “thought emporium,” which is an “elusive concept that allows for the reading experience to flourish in various formats, including the print codex form” (22).

Although they agree that there needs to be an acceptance that the digital age is already upon us, their approaches differ in bridging the gap between concept and practice. Durant and Horava have more hope in leniency with the evolution and adaptation of the libraries. Meanwhile, Manoff supports more control of its future. The data in Cox et al.’s survey reflects these differences in what the stakeholders believed were the essential vital trends to look out for in the future of libraries. The consensus had a “lack of unanimity. Many participants saw trends as potentially transformational. They also realized that change was complex and unpredictable, and impacted various institutions differently” (500).

Finally, it is essential to mention that Durant, Horava, and Manoff all assume the importance of this topic and how it is imperative to have more conversations surrounding the fate and future of libraries. To each of them, it is not a matter of when libraries need to consider adapting to the changing tides but how. The library’s core value of being fair and diplomatic in its efforts should remain its main impetus. As for how the library’s means meet these ends, it is in the eye of the beholder. For some, practicing acceptance and rolling with the punches seems the best way to adapt, while others seem ambivalent but support more control. Most of all, the consensus rings clear: the digital age is here, and there is no way to escape it, whether we like it or not. Gone are the days of antiquity when the answer could only be found within a physical page. The inevitable adaptation to digital technology is nigh.

Franz Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis,” made famous by its memorable first sentence, has received many critical analysis attempts since its 1915 publication. Many authors and scholars have wished to dive into his work to extract its meaning – is it a metaphor for some grander philosophical abstraction? Should the story be taken literally? Was it all a fever dream, or should we take Kafka at his word? Gregor Samsa waking and finding himself turned into a giant insect has left a puzzle for the literary world to piece together for over a century since Kafka released “The Metamorphosis.” Topics of debate around whether his short story should be taken figuratively or literally was one crux I found in my research. Stanley Corngold argues for the former in his book Franz Kafka, the Necessity of Form, specifically the chapter “Metaphor and Chiasm.” Corngold’s main point in his interpretation of the crux is that taken as a whole, “Metamorphosis” is rhetorically existential with the sum of all its parts as its meaning. Walter H. Sokel, on the other hand, disagrees with this interpretation and is on the side of the latter argument. In his article “Kafka’s ‘Metamorphosis’: Rebellion and Punishment,” Sokel believes the metaphor argument is not enough and ignores the intricate parts themselves when one only focuses on the sum. To him, it is advantageous to take Kafka at his word. As for which author has the best interpretation, Corngold has a stronger case against Sokel. Although Sokel’s evidence is compelling, Corngold’s philosophical explication leads to a better understanding of “The Metamorphosis” and of Kafka himself.

By focusing on the form and Kafka’s language choices, many Structural and Post-Structural debates have surrounded “The Metamorphosis.” Some other approaches in interpreting this crux have turned to Expressionism and how his short story could be an exaggerated representation of reality rather than the more binary Structuralists or the more fluid Post-Structuralists. Where the Expressionists focus on the psychological and spiritual, Structural and Post-Structuralists hone in on the system behind the language and its construction. The issue being debated is whether or not to see “The Metamorphosis” as a symbolic piece of art and a metaphor for some higher philosophical ground or a literal story of a man who awoke in his bed transformed into a giant insect. The cause for ambiguity lies in Kafka’s treatment of his protagonist, Gregor Samsa, who, upon noticing his transformation, takes little to no worry about his situation – the same goes for his family. What one would expect when something of the sort comes to be their reality would be an earth-shattering experience: a total world collapse and psychological torment. Meanwhile, Samsa is mainly worried about how he will return to work. Although shocked and otherwise disgusted by their son and brother now being a giant insect, they handle it well. Taken together, “The Metamorphosis” is quite realistic in a sense. This realism supports the ambiguousness of either the story being figurative or literal. There is a sense of believability and plausibility.

In Stanley Corngold’s chapter, “Metaphor and Chiasm,” in his book The Necessity of Form, his main argument for the crux is that it is to be interpreted as one giant metaphor. In his chapter, he asks critical questions about how one should understand the “famous literalizations of metaphor that shape the action of many of Kafka’s stories” (Corngold 90). Here, he asks if they run parallel or counter to metamorphosis, if the metaphor is “transformed” or “killed” in Kafka’s work, and if the metaphors are works of thought or a “stabilizing act of thought establishing similarity” (Corngold 90). Corngold suggests that “the trope of chiasm” explains Kafka’s obsession with metaphors (91). He answers the first question of how one is to understand the literalizations of metaphors in Kafka’s work – such as “traveling salesman/crawling insect” – is to realize that “Kafka’s stories reveal the uncanny and energetic possibility of metamorphosis present in all figures. Metaphor is metaphorically charged, upheaval-laden conjunction of images or concepts” (Corngold 97, 98). To him, they do not “run counter or reverse” because “what comes to light is precisely the bizarre life of the metaphor. What is transformed is only restrictive social constraint on how the metaphor is to be read” and therefore “transformed” (Corngold 98). Since “metaphor is produced by thought neither exclusively…nor in a stabilizing effort to establish resemblance,…the intentionality governing the production of metaphor varies” (Corngold 98). Either clichés or image connections produce stabilizations or “upheavals of meaning” (Corngold 98).

Corngold then goes on to argue that it is the trope of chiasm that is mostly at play in Kafka’s work. The metaphors are, therefore, “chiastic parallelism of concepts” (Corngold 99). He then goes on to describe how this concept was found throughout Kafka’s diary and how Kafka was in pursuit of a logical development of the structure of his work that worked much like “a chase or a hunt” (Corngold 100). This formula can be seen in “The Metamorphosis” with Gregor Samsa's transformation. The story’s beginning, “As Gregor awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect,” is the impetus of the chase (Kafka 467). Immediately, the reader is drawn into Kafka’s hunt for the more significant meaning, metaphorically, of his story; meanwhile, Gregor Samsa goes the distance in his evolutionary crescendo as a once man/now giant insect. “The Metaphor, for Kafka, typically represents an inner, a human, attribute or significance in its likeness to an outer or worldly thing,” such as how a man turning into a bug can represent a larger framework or human experience, and “what Kafka can allow is a demonstration of the untruth of the untrue, the emptying of authority from the speciously plausible” (Corngold 102). This is achieved when the everyday world meets a seemingly implausible outcome presented as believably plausible. A man turning into an insect has to be presented as familiar so one can self-reflect against the backdrop of society to see themselves in the mirror. “Kafka’s monstrous heroes are representations of the unconscious obtained by chiastic reversals of the normal metaphor of man, which empowers self-consciousness” (Corngold 104). Making the man right-sized is Kafka’s means to reach an end. Where Corngold and Sokel differ is in this style of interpreting. Where Corngold asks for a wider net, Sokel urges a narrower approach, with many smaller, more specialized nets.

In “Kafka’s ‘Metamorphosis’: Rebellion and Punishment,” Sokel counters the argument of one metaphorical interpretation, saying that “to see nothing but an extended metaphor in Kafka’s work is not to see enough” (204). To him, “the tale is too long, too packed with statements, too rich in meaning to be defined simply as a metaphor, no matter how extended” (204). For example, “the numerous statements in the narrative dealing with the situation of Gregor and his family before the metamorphosis. These alone make for a textual and poetic complexity which overburdens the theory of the single metaphor” (Sokel 204). There is a failure to consider each meaningful plot point of the story, including character backgrounds. Sokel’s article has a few key points, such as questioning if Gregor Samsa’s metamorphosis possesses a function in the total narrative,” how crucial it is to consider the “pre-history of the metamorphosis itself,…Gregor’s musings after he wakes up,…[and the] meaning of the specific insect shape into which Gregor has changed” (205). Instead of seeing the story as an allegory, Sokel advises to study and “take Kafka at his word;” that “every statement made by the author ‘counts’ in the context of his work and that a careful scrutiny of the text may reveal his art and a good bit of its ‘mystery’ to us” (205). Put differently, only taking Kafka as a whole neglects his varied but important multi-faceted parts.

Sokel’s argument for the function of Gregor’s transformation is that it fulfills a wish Gregor made. Soon after Gregor wakes as a giant insect, Gregor reflects on his sour feelings about his job:

“Oh God, he thought, what an exhausting job I’ve picked on! Traveling about day in, day out. It's much more irritating work than doing the actual business in the office, and on top of that, there's the trouble of constant traveling, of worrying about train connections, the bed and irregular meals, casual acquaintances that are always new and never become intimate friends. The devil take it all!” (467)

Following these reflections, Gregor touches his new body with his spindly legs, sending a shudder through him. Contrary to Corngold’s interpretation of one metaphor throughout, Sokel expresses instances like this one as a wish fulfillment. “If we substitute ‘metamorphosis’ for ‘devil’ Gregor’s wish has actually been granted, for the metamorphosis has surely taken the job from him” (Sokel 206).

Similarly, it is revealed that Gregor has been having difficulties at work when the chief clerk arrives, highlighting essential components of Gregor’s backstory before the transformation. The chief clerk calls Gregor out with reprimands about his work as of late, “For some time past your work has been most unsatisfactory” (Kafka 472). Sokel argues that this scene shows how “Gregor’s body was beginning to feel the strain of his work too hard to bear when the metamorphosis occurred, freeing him of any future responsibility” because of dealings with poor performance (Sokel 206). Whereas most people would take sick days at work to help improve their burnout, Gregor’s inadvertent solution was to be turned into a vermin, which would free him of his troubles. Gregor’s musings when he first wakes up are also crucial to Sokel. For one, his metamorphosis was not complete yet. He still had remnants of a human voice and only a hint of a “twittering squeak behind it like an undertone” (Kafka 468). It is not until Gregor gets upset with something his chief clerk says that he loses his ability to speak with a human voice. To Sokel, this scene represents Gregor’s crowning moment in his metamorphosis. “As long as he can be understood, he cannot be a complete insect….This is, of course, Gregor’s agonizing tragedy: that he feels and thinks as a human being while unable to make his humanity felt and known” (Sokel 211). Instead of being able to appease the chief clerk, Gregor succumbs even more to his predicament. Sokel proposes that “the metamorphosis itself is such a treacherous appeasement of a sense of guilt which in demonstrating innocence and helplessness actually invites punishment and destruction” (212). The type of body Gregor is transformed into is evidence of this.

The exact type of bug Gregor is turned into is not stated explicitly in the beginning. Sokel points out that in its original German form, Gregor wakes up to find himself “changed into a giant kind of vermin (‘Ungeziefer’)” (212). This use of the word vermin “connotes something parasitic and aggressive, something that lives off human beings and may suck their blood; on the other hand, it connotes something defenseless, something that can be stepped upon and crushed” (Sokel 212). This statement highlights the duality in the metamorphosis because later, it is discovered that “Gregor does not possess the aggressiveness of the blood-sucking vermin. He does not feed on blood, but on garbage” (Sokel 213). It is not until the charwoman refers to Gregor as an “old dung beetle” that one can believe him to be more like a cockroach (Kafka 492). “The image of the giant cockroach perfectly expresses the two aspects of the metamorphosis, aggression and helplessness, and the order of their importance” (Sokel 213). Instead of him being turned into something scary, he is turned into something that may “nauseate human being but does not attack them. Offensive in looks, it is defenseless in fact” (Sokel 213). These examples support Sokel’s theory of the importance of analyzing key points within the story and how critical it is to examine each as separate but equal parts. It is not enough to only see “The Metamorphosis” as one long-format metaphorical allegory, but instead worthy of a keen eye for investigating its parts. Unlike Corngold, Sokel makes a case that “the metamorphosis accommodates Gregor’s conflicting needs, the need to rebel, and the need to suffer punishment for this rebellion” (214). Because Gregor never once questions the cause of his transformation, “the accident is found to fulfill a function. It comes as the climax of a secret history of hostility and guilt. These combine to erupt in the catastrophe which mutilates and destroys him who has failed to face the turmoil in his soul” (Sokel 214). Without particular notice of critical elements and scenes in the story, Sokel argues, one fails to neglect the textual complexity within, unlike Corngold, who deduces a similar interpretation but infers that it can be done without analyzing each part. To Corngold, this can be achieved by looking at the whole.

Although Sokel’s investigation is thorough and quite compelling because of it, Corngold makes a better argument for “The Metamorphosis” being one extended metaphor. Even though Sokel points out that each scene deserves explication to get to the bottom of the story's mystery and more profound meaning, I think Corngold is correct that it can be done without all that work. Corngold’s method ignores the finer moments within the short story and neglects the poetic aspects. Still, it is also true that broadening the scope and seeing it from a wider lens does the same, if not more, for its philosophical interpretation. To Corngold, “the urgency of social constraint becomes all the more evident when one realizes, on a moment’s reflection, that all words function to a greater or lesser extent as metaphors” (93). Because all metaphors are borne from previous iterations, it is enough to say that the difference between a literal meaning and a metaphor lies only in the memorial of the word or phrase. “So-called literal meaning is itself only the reminiscence of another previous reduction of metaphorical to literal meaning,…the literal word conceals the memory of the will that confined its meaning to one field” (Corngold 93). The entirety of Gregor’s transformation reveals a common evolution of one’s self-reflection after a life-altering experience. At once, he was a man, yet now a small and insignificant wayward soul. Where once he had felt “great pride in the fact that he had been able to provide such a life for his parents and sister in such a fine flat,” he now was up against a severe form of sordid meditation (Kafka 478). By being confined in this form, Gregor is left alienated from the rest of his family, for even his sister seemed “ill at ease” at the sight of him, which “made him realize how repulsive the sight of him still was to her” (Kafka 483). The critical moments in his evolution all point to the same conclusion: that his family is better off without him. “[Things] can’t go on like this,” his sister exclaims, “We’ve tried to look after it and to put up with it as far as is humanly possible” as the family reaches their breaking point (Kafka 495). “The decision that he must disappear was one that he held to even more strongly than his sister, if that were possible” (Kafka 497). The finality of his transformation peaks, then troughs, as his meditation comes to a close and he takes his final breaths. Although one can explicate each scene in “The Metamorphosis” like an expressionist painting, the same can be achieved by a simple read-through from start to finish, without the fine-toothed comb.

The crux of “The Metamorphosis” being either a figurative or literal piece of art is that it depends. One can be on the side of Corngold and believe that it is more symbolic than literal. All that needs to be done is read the story in its entirety to understand the broader, more philosophical metaphor at play, or one can follow Sokel’s advice and analyze each part first. In a Structuralist and Post-Structuralist reading, such as Corngold, taking the story for its whole suffices. Meanwhile, an Expressionist reading, much like Sokel, wishes to take its time and investigate the story under a microscope. There is a sense that the preferred method can be left to the eye of the beholder. What is left is still a mystery. Was it all a fever dream, or can one take Kafka at his word? How one achieves their interpretation is subjective, albeit necessary. Overall, “The Metamorphosis” stands the test of time for researchers and scholars alike – all pining to understand precisely what Kafka meant by turning his protagonist into a giant insect.

Chocolate Ink

Terrified of yourself

of the potential

of the chocolate stuck to the grooves

of your small, right finger

The little one

smearing chocolate

on the crisp eggshell paper

Or

Has her head been pat too many times

by those

who got to have pity over her?

Who hear her stories

Of how she bit

And crawled

And bled

And wept

And suffered the sorrow

So the pet could come sooner

Through grief

To loathe it

The pity

To resent the now purple smear

on the grooves of her right, little finger

Because chocolate turns to ink.

She is who she contends with;

patting herself on the head.

Okay, yes, and

Because your chocolate ink

is my chocolate ink

Or, what if,

I take the chocolate

and you take the ink.

Licking the grooves

and holding your fear

with gloves.

Smooth the ghosts from your hair.

I never cared much for eggshell anyway.

Lilac was always more your color.

Watch Her Buck

Watch the pause - her pace

The rooms in which memory holds

each fold in time

where she really should have died.

Little memory banks

Tinsels of time where something was taken-

Her body

Her whit

Tongue

Mouth

Her humor

Her charm

Absolution

Lenses to see through each.

There is no right answer-

because what is right

only benefits whoever

is in power.

It’s not what kills you

that makes you stronger

It’s whatever kills you first.

So, light her a cigarette and watch her buck.

12/12/21

I see you now as bright as lightning-

small, insignificant-

You could fit under the tread of my boot

skeleton crush

I think, you think

but you’re

wrong

this time

10 steps

That’s all it took

Deep breaths

22 minutes

I am the door

you, outside

I, the catalyst

33-

St. Catherine of Siena

John Belushi

A Kennedy

10 years

A swingset

An annual self-sacrifice.

10 steps

22 minutes

Deep breaths

Umbilical cord now cut.

12/29/21

Reverence of presence in isolation

Slated for indefinite-ness since Christmas

“Absence, a presence”

My shadow, a solace

My mess, a message

Quick pivot

A shuffle

Wrestle the spirits through braids

Time capsules

Sweet somethings

Somnolence, a welcome mat

Sit with me for a while

Sick bellies soak what used to be

Side-stepped for balance, stability, and possession.

Surprise offerings

Limerence, a prison.

Twigs and Grass

I am the sin

I am the necessity of nature

The unlikeliness of the two things combined

I am 22

And I remember the coolness of the sheets; Taken

The warmth of our breath for the ice in our nest

How threatening the sounds

Thread my needle; Tremble

Suffer the hitting and the shoot

Beam of my soft darkness

I am the honey under your tooth

We bear the climb; Fall careless

Caught me in the middle of the wrinkles

Maybe we’ll start again? Shaken

Beneficial to new vulnerability

The consistent surprise of the two things entwined

THE BOOK OF MARGERY KEMPE

by A.N. Kersey

[Book 1.12] Margery’s Burden

Margery was 20 years old when her first child died at birth and when she had her first vision. The young woman would lie on her back quietly among her sheets with curious intentness. She sought no one, though, indeed she had once when she met her husband, John. He was less than adequate in profession than her father, the mayor, but served her quite well. He always had tenderness and compassion for her, even when this creature was absolved of her wit. His presence now brought about great sorrow and dread, feeling herself suffer from the debt of matrimony. When they sat together for dinner, opposite her husband, the table covered with a fleshy linen tablecloth, he would ask his wife, “Would you rather me be slain than to lie naturally with you as I had before? If a man would smite off my head with a sword, tell me truthfully and do not lie—for you say you won’t—would you rather my head to be smote off or else suffer in meddling with me again?”

“Truly I would rather see you slain.” Margery would look at him coldly, a candle between them casting a yellowish glow around their faces and necks.

From time to time she would linger in her memories, to get back to the earliest of her consciousness so she could recount the years. She proved herself to be insurmountable – each time she reached further, the shapes that made up the fabric of her being seemed to vanish if approached too closely. For, once she embarked on this decent her sails would swell until fully submerged. Margery was rushing along again concentrating all her powers on the shapes and straining against the light of day – closing herself off laboriously in an effort of will. She seemed to hover above the expanse of the room. Margery had experienced this before; it meant she had begun to mount what she most desired. It did not disturb her when the figures would come, dripping slowly, bringing in their own setting. Slightly at first with only a faint imposing suggestion, then a sudden downpour with a continual and lofty slap, slap, slap, in the middle of the daytime.

Margery seemed suddenly delighted to spread herself throughout her room, clutching at her bedside. “There, she’s awake,” called a young maid in a rose-colored dress. She led the way to Margery’s side with two others following behind her, a smaller girl of four in a bright printed dress that danced in and out of Margery’s view, and another she did not recognize.

“I ask for a ghostly Father, a Priest,” said Margery. She needed to confess her sin that crept within her consciousness. For she was ever mired by the devil, her enemy, saying to her, When you are in good health, child, you have no need for confession. God is merciful enough for you to do penance by yourself alone and all will be forgiven. And when you are at times sick, you should be damned for you are not absolved. Margery oftentimes fasted on bread and water in full will with devout prayers, but never showed her sin when in confession. Margery made her way to the narrow staircase.

“Where is she off to?” asked the youngest one in the bright printed dress.

“Girl, come here,” said the maid, motioning with swift hands for her to come closer.

“But she’ll fall through.”

“Get out of here with you. Call for the Father downstairs,” the maid said with one last lofty suggestion.

The bright dress fluttered at the very top of the stairs, and then fully dissolved as she made her way to the bottom.

Margery considered a moment how far back she’d gone in the house of her past before reluctantly falling to her knees on the cold wood floor at the top of the stairwell. She stared at the crosses on the wall and thought of the devil opening his mouth, all full of flames, drawing closer as if to swallow her in. She thought of her enemy begging for her, “Forsake your Christianity. You know neither virtue nor goodness.”

Her confessor came sharply, a fleeting physical presence bounding up the staircase, hastily reproving her before she fully said her intended words. Margery no more said what she ought to have – only biting at her hand instead. Once alone, the being wonderfully used her body as an instrument to confess her sin, tearing at her skin grievously against her heart with the tips of her fingernails. Kneeling still, she bent down and smelled the pungent woodiness of the planks beneath her, the same lumber that made the bed where her strength would be bound so she could no longer keep her will.

Margery’s hair lay in black braids among her flimsy sheets, staring at the dark corner in front of her. In accordance with the priest, the maid tied a rope around her wrists and fastened them to her bedposts. Sheltered in the same pale blue frock, the girl smoothed her hands beneath her restraints, pricking at the small print of cloves and seeds. Heaps of winter rushed in, colder than any stone, making the air seem multiplied and whispered.

As her keepers were away, she saw verily with sunken cheeks a bent figure appear from the darkened place in front of her, leading himself with conviction. The figure bending over her was considerably muscular in frame, growing in nature even as she watched. Mechanically he moved closer, bowing his head over her poor body, easily, amiably. Keeping her thoughts away from the shroud of silence around her and from the cross dangling from his neck, she lay pale with beads of sweat pooling at her temples, feeling the warmth from the fire at the edge of her room. Soft, blue night poured in through the windows. Her frame shrank beneath his, clad in purple silk, seating himself beside her. Beautiful.

“Daughter, why have you forsaken me, though I have never forsaken you?”

A glow of warmth pulsed through her frozen body. Her heart clutched to her breast, as if suddenly conscious of some inherent, distinct function. She looked at him with wild eyes. “And anon, I see you now as bright as lightning,” she said through pinched lips.

For a time he stood, passing his hand over her tired forehead, pressing on her chin. He looked for a minute at the under-sized body, he noticed how she shook. The girl was steady in her wits and in her reason as she watched him rise back into the silence, not with haste, but right easily, stirring himself into the depths so she could behold him in the air until she was shrouded with solitude again.