Good Bones

MARGARET ATWOOD
was born in Ottawa, Ontario, in 1939. During her childhood she spent many summers in the bush country of northern Ontario and Quebec. Upon graduation from the University of Toronto in 1961, she took her master’s degree from Radcliffe College the following year and went on to pursue doctoral studies at Harvard University.

Novelist and poet, critic and editor, Atwood is one of the most prolific and important writers of contemporary literature. Equally acclaimed as a writer of both fiction and poetry, she devotes much of her creative energy to giving literary shape to the aspirations, fears, and foibles of her society. Her many honours include the Governor General’s Award for Poetry, the Governor General’s Award for Fiction, the
Los Angeles Times
Fiction Award, the Giller Prize for Fiction, the Booker Prize, and several honorary degrees.

Margaret Atwood resides in Toronto, Ontario.

General Editor: David Staines

ADVISORY BOARD
Alice Munro
W.H. New
Guy Vanderhaeghe

T
HE RED GERANIUMS
fluorescing on the terrace, the wind swaying the daisies, the baby’s milk-fed eyes focusing for the first time on a double row of beloved teeth – what is there to report? Bloodlessness puts her to sleep. She perches on a rooftop, her brass wings folded, her head with its coiffure of literate serpents tucked beneath the left one, snoozing like a noon pigeon. There’s nothing to do but her toenails. The sun oozes across the sky, the breezes undulate over her skin like warm silk stockings, her heart beats with the systole and diastole of waves on the breakwater, boredom creeps over her like vines.

She knows what she wants: an event, by which she means a slip of the knife, a dropped wineglass or bomb, something broken. A little acid, a little gossip, a little hi-tech megadeath: a sharp thing that will wake her up. Run a tank over the geraniums, turn the wind up to hurricane so the daisies’ heads tear off and hurtle through the air like bullets, drop the baby from the balcony and watch the mother swan-dive after him, with her snarled Ophelia hair and addled screams.

The melon-burst, the tomato-coloured splatter – now that’s a story! She’s awake now, she sniffs the air, her wings are
spread for flight. She’s hungry, she’s on the track, she’s howling like a siren and she’s got your full attention.

No news is good news, everyone knows that. You know it, too, and you like it that way. When you’re feeling bad she scratches at your window, and you let her in.
Better them than you
, she whispers in your ear. You settle back in your chair, folding the rustling paper.

E
VERYONE WANTS IN
on it. Everyone! Not just the cat, the pig and the dog. The horse too, the cow, the rhinoceros, the orang-outang, the horn-toad, the wombat, the duckbilled platypus, you name it. There’s no peace any more and all because of that goddamn loaf of bread.

It’s not easy, being a hen.

You know my story. Probably you had it told to you as a shining example of how you yourself ought to behave. Sobriety and elbow-grease. Do it yourself. Then invest your capital. Then collect. I’m supposed to be an illustration of
that?
Don’t make me laugh.

I found the grain of wheat, true. So what? There are lots of grains of wheat lying around. Keep your eyes to the grindstone and you could find a grain of wheat, too. I saw one and picked it up. Nothing wrong with that. Finders keepers. A grain of wheat saved is a grain of wheat earned. Opportunity is bald behind.

Who will help me plant this grain of wheat?
I said.
Who? Who?
I felt like a goddamn owl.

Not me, not me
, they replied.
Then I’ll do it myself
, I said, as the nun quipped to the vibrator. Nobody was listening, of course. They’d all gone to the beach.

Don’t think it didn’t hurt, all that rejection. Brooding in my nest of straw, I cried little red hen tears. Tears of chicken blood. You know what that looks like, you’ve eaten enough of it. Makes good gravy.

So, what were my options? I could have eaten that grain of wheat right away. Done myself a nutritional favour. But instead I planted it. Watered it. Stood guard over it night and day with my little feathered body.

So it grew. Why not? So it made more grains of wheat. So I planted those. So I watered those. So I ground them into flour. So I finally got enough for a loaf of bread. So I baked it. You’ve seen the pictures, me in my little red hen apron, holding the loaf with its plume of aroma in between the tips of my wings, smiling away. I smile in all the pictures, as much as you can smile, with a beak. Whenever they said
Not me
, I smiled. I never lost my temper.

Who will help me eat this loaf of bread?
I said.
I will
, said the cat, the dog and the pig.
I will
, said the antelope.
I will
, said the yak.
I will
, said the five-lined skink.
I will
, said the pubic louse. They meant it, too. They held out their paws, hooves, tongues, claws, mandibles, prehensile tails. They drooled at me with their eyes. They whined. They shoved petitions through my mail slot. They became depressed. They accused me of selfishness. They developed symptoms. They threatened suicide. They said it was my fault, for having a loaf of bread when they had none. Every single one of them, it seemed, needed that goddamn loaf of bread more than I did.

You can bake more
, they said.

So then what? I know what the story says, what I’m supposed to have said:
I’ll eat it myself, so kiss off
. Don’t believe a word of it. As I’ve pointed out, I’m a hen, not a rooster.

Here
, I said.
I apologize for having the idea in the first place. I apologize for luck. I apologize for self-denial. I apologize for being a good cook. I apologize for that crack about nuns. I apologize for that crack about roosters. I apologize for smiling, in my smug hen apron, with my smug hen beak. I apologize for being a hen
.

Have some more
.

Have mine
.

I
ALWAYS THOUGHT
it was a mistake, calling you Hamlet. I mean, what kind of a name is that for a young boy? It was your father’s idea. Nothing would do but that you had to be called after him. Selfish. The other kids at school used to tease the life out of you. The nicknames! And those terrible jokes about pork.

I wanted to call you George.

I am
not
wringing my hands. I’m drying my nails.

Darling, please stop fidgeting with my mirror. That’ll be the third one you’ve broken.

Yes, I’ve seen those pictures, thank you very much.

I
know
your father was handsomer than Claudius. High brow, aquiline nose and so on, looked great in uniform. But handsome isn’t everything, especially in a man, and far be it from me to speak ill of the dead, but I think it’s about time I pointed out to you that your Dad just wasn’t a whole lot of fun. Noble, sure, I grant you. But Claudius, well, he likes a drink now and
then. He appreciates a decent meal. He enjoys a laugh, know what I mean? You don’t always have to be tiptoeing around because of some holier-than-thou principle or something.