Saturday 10 September 2016
Tuesday 6 September 2016
Wooden Egg
Once upon
a time, in the Kingdom of Eggs, there was a wooden egg.
The poor egg was miserable. All the other
eggs – all! – hatched out in time, and gave birth to eagles and platypuses, chickens
and tortoises, frogs and fritillaries. But not the poor wooden egg. She’d
never, ever, give birth to anything.
All the other eggs she knew mocked her
mercilessly for it. “You’re useless,” they crowed (and clucked, and chirped). “We,
all of us, will know the ultimate fulfilment of hatching out, and giving birth to
things that crawl or hop or fly. But what will you ever know except your own
wooden self?”
In despair, the wooden egg finally decided
to commit suicide. Rolling up to the top of her building, she threw herself off
the roof, confident that the fall would smash her into a ruin. But all that
happened was that she bounced harmlessly on the ground, and rolled until she
came up against a wall.
Of course the other eggs were delighted. “Just
look at that now,” they jeered. “She can’t even kill herself. What a waste of
space.” And the poor wooden egg was so miserable that she didn’t even try to
reply.
It was when she was lying there, sobbing,
that the Great Yolk of the Kingdom happened by on her carriage. The Great Yolk happened
to be in a good mood, and was naturally compassionate besides. And, furthermore,
on this day she’d a little time to spare.
So when she saw the poor wooden egg
sobbing, she stopped her carriage. At the sight of her, the little crowd of
jeering eggs scattered and rolled away as quickly as they could, for they were
all afraid of her. The Great Yolk rolled over to the sobbing wooden egg and
helped her up tenderly.
“It hurts me that anyone in my kingdom should
be so sad,” the Great Yolk said. “Tell me how I can help you, and I will.”
“All you can do, Your Eggselency,” the
wooden egg sobbed, “is find a way for me to end my miserable and useless
existence.” And she poured out the whole story.
The Great Yolk smiled. “There’s no need to
despair as yet,” she said. “If you could become a real egg, and hatch out like
one, that would make you happy, is that it?”
“That’s right,” the wooden egg said. “But
how’s that possible? I am wood all through.”
“Do you know the mountain outside the town?”
the Great Yolk said. “It is said that right at the top, just below the peak,
there is a cave. Inside that cave, it is said, is a Holy Egg who has lived
there many centuries. If you can make your way to that cave, She can help you.”
“Can She?” the wooden egg asked,
sceptically. “Has She ever helped anyone yet?”
“Well, no,” the Great Yolk confessed. “No
egg has ever tried to go up the mountain slopes because of the danger of the
stones smashing their shells. But you’re of wood, and, besides, what do you
have to lose?”
“That’s true enough,” the wooden egg
decided. “What do I have to lose?” So, thanking the Great Yolk, she rolled
right out of the town, and kept rolling until she came to the mountain. And, at
the foot of it, she saw a sign.
“This is your first warning,” it announced.
“If you go further, you will see things better not seen.”
“What do I have to lose?” the wooden egg
asked, and rolled up the slope. And, one after another, she saw things that
were far better left unseen, things that made her flinch and try to look away,
but in whichever direction she looked, there were other things left unseen. But still she went on.
A third of the way up the mountain she saw
a second sign. “This is your second warning,” it said. “If you go further, you
will feel things better not felt.”
And then it got much, much worse. The things
she felt were things nobody, not even a wooden egg, should feel. But she still
rolled on.
“This is your third warning,” she saw, the
third sign informed her, two-thirds of the way up the mountain. “Go further,
and you will know things you’ll wish you’d never known.”
That didn’t stop the wooden egg, though the
things that she suddenly found flooding her mind, the vast and terrible gulfs
of knowledge that opened before her, almost made her want to flee down the
slope. It was only the memory of the
jeers of the other eggs that made her go on.
And at last she reached the cave at the
mountain top. “Great Holy Egg,” she asked humbly, “I want to enter into Your
presence with a request.”
“Stay where you are,” a voice came from
within. “I am polishing my shell. But I know what you want. Are you sure you
want it?”
“Perfectly sure,” the wooden egg said. “I
braved the mountain slopes to find You for this purpose alone.”
The Holy Egg’s voice came from within the
cave. “Very well,” She said. “I will do as you wish. But understand that I can
only turn you into a real egg. What you’ll hatch out isn’t under my control.”
“All I want to do is hatch,” the wooden egg
said. “It doesn’t matter what.”
“All right then,” the Holy Egg’s answer
came. “I will wait for you to return to your city, for if I change you here you’ll
never be able to make it down the slope without shattering on the stones. Go
back home, and wait for midnight.”
And so the wooden egg, rejoicing, rolled
down the slope, and back to the city.
“Back from the mountain, are you?” some of the
other eggs mocked. “And look, you’re wood as always. The Holy Egg must have
chased you off.”
“She didn’t even try to go up the mountain,”
the other eggs laughed. “It was all a sham.”
“Just you wait,” the wooden egg muttered. “I’ll
show you all.” Ignoring the further jeers of the other eggs, she went to her
room, closed the door, and lay down on the bed to wait for midnight. It was a
long time coming, but finally it did come.
Precisely at the stroke of midnight, she felt something
stir inside her, and a tapping on the inside of her shell. “It’s happened,” she
whooped. “I’m a real egg, and I’m about to hatch.”
And she was. The tap came again, harder and
more insistent, and then it began to crack. In a moment more, it had
splintered, and as she lay content on her bed, her baby came into the world.
And it came into the world, and it came
into the world. All the long length of it.
Coiled on the bedroom floor, the baby
looked around, its forked tongue licking the air. “This is paradise,” it hissed
to itself, as it sensed the world around it. “I wonder what I did to deserve
this.”
It was quite correct.
For an egg-eating snake, the Kingdom of
Eggs was the best possible place to be.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2016
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