It had blue eyes. That was all she could say about him. She thought him a tree, his arms the branches of it, his beard the leaves. She did not see his private parts because of the leaves, the beard, which layered down to the ground, trailing off to where the squirrels had curled and gone to sleep in it, their tails over their faces. She did not notice he was a man. She thought him a tree, a tree with blue eyes, rooted there, with squirrels.
         She built her home next to the tree, built it herself with timbers shaved by herself and notched by herself, timbers resting against each other. She packed the open areas with mud and whatever she found, made a fire inside above which to cook, in front of which to warm, beside which to coax her fears and penitence to lie down. Her husband was gone, a Russian. There had never been a house, not their own, had never been a moment when she did not think but would not say, “you are a Russian.”
         It was a long time ago when she moved there, when he was gone, when she built the little house by herself. The trees were thick in that section, a section with not too little water, not too much; a section sufficient in itself. The bible had gone for fire in winter, the icons, the old chair, everything but the wool sweater, the braided rug.
         She said that the trees were thick in that section. Even when the season was not dark, it was dark. She said there was hardly any sky to be seen. She built next to the tree with the flowing leaves and the squirrels because of the blue in it like sky, because it had blue eyes, she said.

Everywhere a lake, that’s what they said about that place. They said that everywhere you went there was a lake. There was a census for lakes, a census for trees. They wanted to know the deep of the country provided by lakes, the tall of it provided by trees. Everywhere a lake, they said, a lake and trees. They liked knowing how many there were, how many were in that place.

The woman understood things, took pride in order, in logic, so was at a loss to explain when her sister was found in the lake, under an overhang, sound asleep underwater with no shoes. She saw the feet first and brought her out as she would any person found under water, and was astonished that this person was her sister, whom she knew to be dead already, and cremated.
         When she brought her out of the water her sister stayed sitting at a slant, her ankles crossed, her arms slack in her lap, leaning, as if against something. After a few minutes, her sister opened her eyes, slowly, looking around, water beading in her lashes, on her skin. She saw the woman, looked at her a moment as she might a tax official, a census taker, her eyes dull, disinterested, and said, twisting on her ring finger, “take this away.”
         The woman thought then and again later, every time she thought of it, which was often, that her sister came back without beauty or wit, with dull, disinterested eyes. Why would she do that, why would she ask for trouble? Later, no matter how much later, every time, she would not understand why she came back at all, if just to be this: less.
         “Okay,” she said about the ring and took it. The obligation of the ring, the homelessness of it, burdened without inspiration. It made her feel that neither of them, from then on, could grow very much, just for having had the burden of it.

She built next to me, next to my branches and layered, flowing leaves, next to the parts of me she did not see, because of the blue in my eyes, because I have blue eyes, she said.
         Once I was a Russian, and then for a time I wasn’t and then for a time I was, and then, for a longer time, I wasn’t. I went into the forest one day when I was not anything in particular but everything I am. I walked in it and around it and through it and across it, on every inch of it, among every green and most green and some green and every brown and most brown and some brown, and finally stopped in this small space I have been in before, this place where for no reason in particular I stopped. There was room enough for me, the branches of me, my leaves, the small forest animals, a small house, if someone were to build one. I stood in this place for a long time until I no longer noticed I was a man.
         She said she thought my arms were the branches of a tree, my beard the leaves, she said. She built next to me. She did not see my private parts because of the leaves, the beard, which layered down to the ground, trailing off to where the squirrels had curled and gone to sleep in it, their tails over their faces. I could not turn to see her eyes, her parts, the smoke I smelled from the cooking, warming, calming fire. I could not turn and see her home in the woods. But after a while, after a long while, under the spread of me, lower, under the place where I stopped, lower than the layered leaves, the curled and sleeping forest animals, I felt the sightless tendrils of her weave the earth aside; felt the finest spaces forming out for roots, felt the spread of her among, the brush of her along, my roots; deep down felt the forest of her, the reach she made within me in this place to find the waters and the things we need.

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