‘Glass and Faceless’ - “Ruth: August 16, 1983”
Ruth reminisces about a “Voice you don’t know at all. It isn’t a man’s or a woman’s, but the same as glass, as faceless as water.” Ruth employs twin metaphors to construe the sophistication of the voice. The voice is mysterious; thus, it cannot be unconditionally classed as either womanly or manlike. Accordingly, the voice surpasses old-fashioned gender cataloguing.
“Plain as day” - “Andrew: August 16, 1983”
Andrew expounds, “Tonight, I sat alone in the woods at the top of the hill looking down through the witch hazel branches at her,. I could look into the kitchen see all she was doing, shining saucers, setting her house in order, she opened the farthest back screenless window, leaned out. All that way and into the dusk, I could see it, the way her lips moved. Praying. I could hear her, plain as day.” The figurative plainness stresses that Andrew is cognizant of all of his mother’s engagements. He perceives his mothers’ activities from a bird’s perspective which endows him to seamlessly interpret her lips.
Lifeline - “Andrew: August 16, 1983”
Andrew confirms, “I hid behind the witch hazel, pressed my check to the smooth bark, a lifeline, a saviour.” The allegorical lifeline renders the bark liberator who redeems Andrew from undesirable judgments. Kissing the bark is synonymous to being unequivocally cherished and accommodated by Mother Nature.
A Cusp - “Andrew: August 16, 1983”
Andrew elucidates, “All my life, here, where things winged, blessed, merciless, are real. Where the world is a cusp, and I am left holding to the sharp edge. I am this, I am that, I love, I cannot. I must, I must not. How to name that place in between, the cusp of the world?” The cusp is metaphoric of Andrew’ s demanding quandary which arises from his nonconformance with mainstream conventions. Being ‘in that place in between the cusp’ embodies the predicament that is endorsed by indecisiveness.
