VII. Change
By Anne Carson
Somehow Geryon made it to adolescence.
____
Then he met Herakles and the kingdoms of his life all shifted down a few notches.
They were two superior eels
at the bottom of the tank and they recognized each other like italics.
Geryon was going into the Bus Depot
one Friday night about three a.m. to get change to call home. Herakles stepped off
the bus from New Mexico and Geryon
came fast around the corner of the platform and there it was one of those moments
that is the opposite of blindness.
The world poured back and forth between their eyes once or twice. Other people
wishing to disembark the bus from New Mexico
were jamming up behind Herakles who had stopped on the bottom step
with his suitcase in one hand
trying to tuck in his shirt with the other. Do you have change for a dollar?
Geryon heard Geryon say.
No. Herakles stared straight at Geryon. But I'll give you a quarter for free.
Why would you do that?
I believe in being gracious. Some hours later they were down
at the railroad tracks
standing close together by the switch lights. The huge night moved overhead
scattering drops of itself.
You're cold, said Herakles suddenly, your hands are cold. Here.
He put Geryon's hands inside his shirt.
"VII. Change” from AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF RED: A NOVEL IN VERSE by Anne Carson, copyright © 1998 by Anne Carson. Used by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved.
Source:
Autobiography of Red: A Novel in Verse
(Penguin Random House LLC, 1998)
