By G.R. Nanda
When the windstorm and its sounds cleared, drumroll and faint chatter joined the noise of the vicinity.
Singing voices soon joined the mix. Male and female.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa………………………..”
Nickel sat still. He had become too numb to try moving the egg or breaking it with force. The egg was dark enough to make him drowsy.
The chorus died away and was replaced by the raspy, yet booming voice of what seemed to be an old man.
“The age of the Hawk was an age long ago,
in an age before the past world…….an age before our world.
The world was endowed by and created by the hawks, their lives and activities defining the expanse that was our early universe.
From the depths of time and space was formed……………….
……………………………………..the egg.”
The speech seemed to be spoken by a man nearby in a loud voice over the sound of ricocheting drums.
The frenzy of sound was disorienting, bombarding the shell of Nickel’s egg. It reverberated on the ground and vibrated up the shell.
“It was from the depths of time and space that the body of Mother Hawk was impregnated by the all-consuming Father Hawk.”
“The egg was held in the cosmos- in a nest of space and stars for Mother Hawk to sit upon. The shell was almost as dark as the space around it. Where its oval shape was, a pitch-black spot was formed, blocking out the white pearls of stars streaking the galaxy.”
“The darkness of the shell was so thick– thick enough to be the hard armor for the secrets awaiting inside of the egg.”
“For inside the egg……….were the secrets of life!”
A chorus of gasps, feigning surprise, sounded. It seemed to come from the left and the right of the square.
The drumming simultaneously slammed down in prolonged beat, followed by its echo and the beginning of many many soft female voices singing in unison in a high falsetto. It was a wail. A strong, structured and uniform wail sounding the revelation of life.
“Life was hidden. Kept away from Father Hawk. Mother Hawk refused to share. To open. She said it was too soon. Life need not have its eggshell cracked, for life was still being nurtured in the womb and nest of space.”
“This………… angered Father Hawk! He could not wait to see his scion.”
“He raged through the cosmos, trying to pry into the nest which was shrouded in secrecy.”
The drumroll picked up again, becoming louder than ever. It was a thundering racket.
“He pried the best he could, only causing distant stars to explode and planets to collide and burst with his tantrums. It was all in vain, for he was always shunned and his actions never touched the egg.”
“In this time, Mother Hawk and Father Hawk lost their way, becoming angry with each other, for they were trying to undo the actions of the other.”
“Meanwhile, the life inside the egg was roiling and growing. It was an endless void contained in the egg of beginning. It was a formless entity. Swirling. Morphing. It was gaseous and free moving. It was both nothing and everything. It was both colorless and filled with a platitude of hues so intertwined that it really wasn’t any single hue.”
“The inside of the egg was thrashing against the unmovable hard shell, with its free moving and contradictory domains.”
“It was love. It was hate. It was peace. It was conflict. It was desire. It was disgust. It was anger. It was compassion. It was cruelty. It was sadness. It was happiness. It was beautiful. It was gruesome. It was jealousy. It was appreciation. It was deceit and treachery. It was loyalty. It was the best and worst of Mother and Father Hawk.”
“ It–was–life.”
“It was once all there.”
“The secrets of our own existence…………… swirling and bursting without form.”
“Father Hawk wasted away on his own, separated from Mother Hawk. He could not bear to look at her, for he always spotted her swollen womb, Mother Hawk sitting placidly on her nest. Seeing her, he was reminded of her egg and the face of the child inside that he could not see.”
“He thrashed away on his own, angry, bitter– despairing.”
“One day, he sat by himself, trying not to think of his unborn child. No matter how hard he tried, he could not think of anything else. So finally, he gave up and decided to allow his mind to wander to the depth of Mother Hawk’s womb and the space around the egg atop which she sat. The space littered with the stars that would come to illuminate life that was protected by the egg.”
“He came to silently imagine the egg and the space around it, harboring his child. He suddenly got to thinking of how he could take his wife’s attention away from the egg she so carefully nurtured.”
“He had to find a way to pry in between the space of the womb and the nest of space and stars that Mother Hawk sat upon.”
“Suddenly………………………”
The drums quickened and then abruptly stopped.
“Fathew Hawk came up with an idea.”
“It was a risky and bold idea.”
Snares began to thud fervently, but softer and quieter than the drumming from before.
“One that could horribly offend Mother Hawk if she were to see through his motives.”
“Father Hawk planned to seduce Mother Hawk into making love, widening the space between her body and the nest and also loosening her grasp on the egg.”
“He was going to try to penetrate into the space of her womb and in doing so, rock the egg enough that the shell would crack.”
“So, one day, he decided to use his last resort. He decided to do the very thing that he knew Mother Hawk would not be able to resist. The thing that he saved, kept at bay for only the special nights on which love was to be made:
He danced towards Mother Hawk with his feathers puffed out. They pointed out from his chest, nearing Mother Hawk and her nest.”
“Upon seeing him, Mother Hawk immediately loosened her body, letting her womb’s grip on the egg of life lessen.”
“Forgetting all, Mother Hawk joined in Father Hawk’s embrace, partaking in the dance of love.”
“As Father Hawk penetrated Mother Hawk over and over again, the force of explosions in Mother Hawk’s womb and her nest rocked the egg and crushed its shell.”
“The Big Bang had started!”
Nickel’s heart jolted in his chest and his eyes widened in the darkness of his egg.
The Big Bang. Like the Big Bang from physics used to explain the science of the birth of the universe.
Except………….
…………the Big Bang was literally two hawk gods banging each other.
Normally, Nickel would have scoffed and giggled at the obscene absurdity. Now though, he couldn’t help but find himself swept away in the mythology of the two primordial hawks.
After all, what else was left to believe in?
The question horrified him.
“The stars, galaxies and planets of the womb and spiraling hawk nest imploded, all the contents shaking and meshing together. The heat made the dark egg shell go from as black as the cosmos to a radiating and glowing red.”
“While Mother Hawk and Father Hawk were caught up in their passion, the egg shell finally shattered.”
A resounding cacophony of scattered drumming sounded, the loudest of all and so loud that Nickel winced at his throbbing eardrums.
A chorus of low female voices sounded, turning into a falsetto wail.
“LIFE-WAS……..RELEASED!”
The substance that had been trapped inside of the egg for so long was finally free to stretch and collide with planets and stars that were all imploding and colliding with each other.
“Life was now a part of the universe.”
The music of flutes came into being, taking form in a happy harmonizing crescendo with a sprinkling of steady drum beats.
“It was flowing around and across the universe. Immature. Vulnerable. Underdeveloped. Mother Hawk had wanted to wait for life to grow strong enough to be able to crack its egg shell itself. Now, underdeveloped and with space in the shambles of wrecked starstuff, life could not proliferate. It needed a home. And most importantly, it needed a caretaker to guide it through the development that was supposed to happen in the egg, but now had to occur in the dangerous, consequential reality of the universe.”
“Mother Hawk was furious that Father Hawk had tricked her into letting go of her egg.”
“Father Hawk was ashamed of having let his premature offspring, life, loose in a dangerous universe. He could now see that Mother Hawk had been right about their child still needing to develop and grow before awakening from the egg. Seeing life move freely and without form through the universe he wrecked, he was deeply guilty, embarrassed and fearful for his child’s safety.”
“Life stayed in its soft and gaseous embryonic form, unable to thrive in one place. While it was soft, the universe was flaming and filled with sharp shards of space rock.”
“Father Hawk begged for forgiveness from Mother Hawk, but she would not have it. Life was now doomed to fail. She screamed that the egg was supposed to allow for life to develop in safety before it could thrive on its own in the scary universe. Life would not be strong enough to exist in the universe before first being strong enough to break through the egg shell.”
“Life should have been able to take care of itself on its own in the universe. Instead, now it was too weak– infantile, needing a caretaker to nurture it.”
“Mother Hawk, having laid the egg and kept it warm should have been the one with the most knowledge to nurture life.”
“But she was too exhausted from having laid the egg and having watched over it. Life was supposed to break free from the shell, existing independently, giving Mother Hawk her well deserved rest.”
“Now, too weak to offer anything but feeble help, Mother Hawk was wracked with the stresses of fear for her doomed and vulnerable child and anger directed at her husband.”
“Mother Hawk moaned and cried in anguish, sobbing tears out of her beady bird eyes. Whenever Father Hawk tried to console her, she screamed at him in rage.”
“ ‘Leave me alone!’ she said in between sniffles and moans. ‘You brought this upon us and our child! If only you weren’t the only hawk around to be my husband!’”
“Hurt, Father Hawk left her to wither alone in her withering nest.”
“The nest was only supposed to host the egg and Mother Hawk until the birth of life. The nest was only supposed to last until then. The star stuff that held it together was dissipating. Mother Hawk didn’t want to leave and face the universe and she definitely didn’t want to face Father Hawk, whom she deeply despised for what he had brought upon.”
“Father Hawk felt helpless. He was wracked with guilt and shame, so he roamed the universe, opening his large feathered wings and soaring through the starry heavens and cosmos.”
“He wanted to think in solitude. But most of all, he wanted to escape.”
“He wandered far away, moving in between hurtling asteroids, dodging dying suns and cowering at the fire of wrecked galaxies.”
“He wandered far and wide, never stopping until he happened upon an old huntsman along the ways of a rocky canyon he was exploring. The huntsman was stalking animals amidst a pool of stars encompassing the grey canyons formed out of asteroid rock. He would spring them with his arrows which were tipped at their ends with stars out of his longbow.”
“The huntsman was so successful because the animals often thought the arrows were just far off twinkling stars. That is, until arrows came close enough that the animals could see that they were actually powerful shooting stars. But by then, it was too late.”
“The fiery star-studded arrows were upon them.”
“The huntsman was very sly about the way he moved through the cosmos. He would move quickly from star shape to star shape, standing still in awkward positions so that his body seemed like it was the outlines of stars.”
“Father Hawk had accidentally stumbled upon the man who formed the first constellations.”
“He had stumbled into a starry canyon much like our own, where there were many different animals hiding out in the vast open spaces, protected by the ceilings of rock walls– made out of ancient asteroids that crashed on this small crusty dwarf planet.”
“The many animals crawling and scuttering through the grey rock were like the animals of the Desolate Plains: frolicking squirrels, stealthy coyotes, frantic turkeys, soaring eagles, trotting sheep and grazing elk.”
“Father Hawk was astounded. Looking from behind a large rock wall, he saw the burly grey-haired huntsman standing over a ledge as his long beard flowed in the breeze, wavering from the outline of stars that made up his figure. Below the ledge was the biggest contradiction Father Hawk had ever seen: a wasteland full of life.”
“Father Hawk moved ever forward to see more of the view below the ledge. His claws accidentally crunched some pebbles.”
“The huntsman immediately whirled around, his body leaving the shape and disguise of the stars behind him.”
“Spotting a flock of eagles flying above a cliff pass far below, Father Hawk scuttled behind as quickly as he could and plummeted over the ledge.”
“When he joined the formation of soaring eagles, he spread his wings wide, soaring amongst them into the far reaches of the canyon.”
“The eagles paid him no mind, zooming into the distance, intent on their flight.”
“They flew through jagged openings in bumpy rock walls and over small streams. They swooped over and under rock when it protruded out of the ground or jutted out into the sky from walls surrounding them.”
“Father Hawk’s heart thumped loudly with fear. He needed to know if he was followed by the huntsman, but he didn’t dare look back.”
“And just like that, Father Hawk was no longer a god, but yet another animal of the canyons, on the move and facing the possibility of death at the hands of the ever present huntsman.”
G.R. Nanda 