A Shield for Achilles

Heather Butcher

You are in the quick but seemingly vast waters between boyhood and manhood as I brush through your frizzy net of auburn curls. Samson was a man from the Bible with long hair, and it gave him his strength, or something like that, I say, but I don’t really know because I won’t take you to church. Trace the line that runs from you and back through me and into the coal mines and Baptist churches and dirt roads. You will find no happy daughters along that path. And so having seen this trail stretching endlessly both forward and backward, I placed my feet amongst the moss and ferns and wildflowers, and we walked into the woods together.  

You were six when I made a deal with myself that instead of jumping off a bridge, I would dye my hair cobalt, which is a much more intense color than the dusty blue pills I swallowed to keep my feet on land. I refused to die underwater, not because I am good, but because you are. The mountain women called for me, fawn skins draped across their shoulders as they danced and chanted towards the sky. But I saw your face, and knew your name, and I dipped you into the River Styx, in the hope that I could breathe enough for the two of us. 

And it was in that time before breath, an inevitable impermanence, when I was able to hide you from the world, but eventually, the thin elastic walls around you shrank, and the doctor pulled you from me, your body quiet and small and pale as a kitten. My body had held for thirty-three weeks. It was November. 

I used to hide myself from the world too, soaking in the bath for as long as I could, the water starting out as hot as sparks, slowly fading into the warmth of a September sunbeam, and then finally so cool that I covered my back with a washcloth to stay warm. And then I’d spin the hot faucet wide open, pulling my knees into my chest and curling my toes under my feet as the new heat rumbled into the tub. I saw death everywhere. Poisoned food. Incurable diseases. Tragic accidents. I was scared of the thoughts that wafted through my head. I was afraid of the words that moved recklessly across my lips. I was terrified of going to Hell. And then there was you. Autonomous. Idealistic. Fearless. The mountain women hissed.

You are taller than me now. Your loose curls an improbably perfect middle ground between your dad’s coils and my waves. And now I give you the shield of Achilles, anchored by the stars, swirling with justice and war, marked by the seasons, witness to violence and survival and joy. And I hope my incantations can bind your feet to the earth, that roots grow from your soles, and that you grow rings within rings within rings. 

Heather Butcher writes flash nonfiction that reveals her unique sense of imagery and language. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and appears in The Ilanot Review, Tahoma Literary Review, and TIMBER. Heather lives in Pennsylvania with her two sons, two cats, and husband.