“The Rescue of the Seven Cities of Atlantis: A Diary of the Engineer’s Wife” (parts 2 & 3) by Alexander Chee

A Letter to Her Majesty in Restless Triumph

“There was no way to know of the success with which the myrtles would take to their new beds here. They bloom now, scent the air vigorously and the children pass along their rows, tempted to take whole boughs away. My queen, I miss the sound of your skirts in the halls of this home, and all our seven cities scattered now makes me weep to think of you there in Attilan, without me. I watch the mermen here, their huge tails scatter the waves to foam as they race each other out to where their whales wait for them, and their laughter as they race their mounts reaches me here, where I write you from my little balcony. As long as they are here, as long as they do not miss the feel of land beneath what was once their feet, that land now far, far beneath the waves, it seems we are safe. Do you remember their screams on the day they were made? Now they cover each other with tattoos made from squid ink, drawn by spine-fish barbs. This is one patriot I watch from here, he shoots from some deep dive, twists into a leap through the air, his long blond braids stream water behind him in silver, then white. I knew him before I knew the engineer. One night, we danced for the capture of the Great Whale, and he was my partner. They remember less and less of our tongue, though, the deeper they dive, and they sing now to each other under the water. We continue to share a music, and it occurs to me to play for them sometime.

“Emily is sad here. Her angels improve, under her tutelage, but the vicar, it seems, lost his heart with the move. At night here nightingales sing and sometimes she finds him under the tree of one or the other, curled around the base as with a lover.

“In the tunnels the trains pass swiftly. Our people move from place to place with such ease that the days balloon with time. And now I must place this letter in its case and tie it to the nautilus that  will carry it to you there. How wise and swift they are, they pass along the bottom of the ocean faster than any bird flies through the adjoining sky. And the shell, to know you held it just days before, across the sea. I pray it moves, in its journey to you, through all our lost gardens. All my love to you.”

*

Deluge

The rains came without ceasing for four weeks and afterwards the water ran across the ground, unable to soak through what was soaked. The sun followed and the days after saw the rain regret its choice and want to return. Now the ground splits open from bursting seeds and vinous beauties trellis this humid air, tease the sunlight through leaves thicker than paper and stems like a wrist. Here there are roses as big as cabbages, and their heads follow the sun’s bloom all day, afraid to look down, watching for the rain, gloried in the sun.

As the summer begins, we do not know what to expect. The engineer works through the night most days, afraid. There will be more storms, he tells me. The oracles say so. For a while, it seemed that we had escaped the watery doom and then with the rain, the sea took flight to follow us here and mock our deluge. At night the cats learn to crawl the balconies. Watch them, the engineer tells me at night in our bed. See how careful they are.

*

Alexander Chee is the author of the novels Edinburgh and The Queen of the Night, and the essay collection How To Write An Autobiographical Novel, all from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. He is winner of a 2003 Whiting Award, a 2004 NEA Fellowship in prose and a 2010 MCCA Fellowship. He is an associate professor of English and Creative Writing at Dartmouth College.

© LIT Magazine Issue #1, 1999