The Opening of Ballet Earth*

*Reprinted from: The Lyric Quarterly, Vol. 9, No. 2 (2465).

Barii Volk is of course Jordon Ligochee's son. Just ten years after Jordan's publication of his five-page Design for Loving established him as our finest contemporary poet, sixteen-year-old Barii echoed his father's success with Shadows, a collection of lyrics ("antiques") in the demanding Rilkash stress-controlled manner. It was, however, to prove more than an echo. The shadows were to pass under relentless examination and Barii was to carry his lyricism and formalism to its logical, though unanticipated, limits; besides his Floors of My Heart, the next year saw a number of uniquely instrumented chamber works and the debut of his First Symphony (The Whilom), played by the New Union Ensemble and conducted by the young composer himself, who came to the console rather like a skinny bird and departed it, after the final drawn beat of his baton and the hammer-blows of thundering ovation, in a heap of sweaty clothing, his hair unkempt, his face drained and weak – happy with the reception afforded this return of his to ancient forms.

In months to come, though, Barii was to move on to newer forms of expression; indeed, one critic remarked that Barii Volk was by himself encompassing the full range and development of contemporary art media. He was to pioneer in the growth of sound crystals, work that finally resulted in the delicately beautiful Mauve Necklace now housed at the Kahlu Museum, sprinkling out impormptu sonatas as the light strikes it, molding its tones and structure to the shifting patterns of light in the room and to the movement of viewers. He was to be one of the first to experiment with energy sculpture, the best-known example of his work being the Waiting Roome commissioned by Councilhome; walking through it, one experiences every neural nuance of anxiety and anticipation. He was to introduce the fraloom to Larnian music and train young performers in the technique of this many-voiced instrument. Everything he took up seemed transformed; critics remarked his insight into essential structures. We all waited to see where his interests would fall next.

And then, five years ago, came the startling news of his renunciation of Larne citizenship. Barii was not available for comment, and for evidence or explanation we had only three poems published a month later – anonymously, yet bearing the stamp of Barii's lyricism. One was in French, that strange ancestor of our own language; the others were translations, one from Rilkash, one from ancient Anglaise. ...

jamais revoir face à vous dans la glace
en arrière de moi
où dans les ans nous trouvons content
à nous

The tree goes on
Into the sky; branch, leaf, twig

Do not stop it.

One lifts
a foot, and puts another
in front of it
to claim

the generous sky.

Some time later, a small privately printed volume made its appearance. Entitled Occasion: Départ, it consisted of a number of extremely short, inter-related "fragments," or units of poetic occasion (the occasion of a single moment, arrested in time). The theme was that of "Coincidence/Collision: the form of a life, the fact of a world perceived." (From the Preface.) There was great disputation among scholars as to whether the piece could actually be considered a single, integrated moment, that is, a poem; or if it must finally be seen as nothing more than a collection of fragments, notes for poems. (I trust that I have made clear my own position on this matter, both here and in several earlier monographs which were in fact among the first studies effected.) Also, there was considerable debate over the volume's intentions and significance – what, for instance, was one to make of the glimmers of another of our ancient languages, Polish? (I refer the reader to my book Othographies for further illumination in this regard, in particular to its thesis of the generation of our language – whose origins I find most manifest in Polish and, of course, French.) Suffice it to say, then, that the reaction was mixed: there were even those who held it to be the literary hoax of the century. At any rate, though the poems appear for the most part translations from "English," and are indeed contingent to the three earlier poems both in substance and structure, most authorities yet agree that there is insufficient evidence to attribute them incontrovertibly to Barii. I believe a few examples should therefore be in order. (Unfortunately space, in the confines of the piece at hand, is limited. Those further interested might look to my essay "Event & Advent," reprinted in Orthographies.)

That tree would ascend to the sky.
And your hand
On the trunk grown larger.

puste plótno, cien zagli,
ruch rosypanych pomyslów;
i podpalam powrotne kroki
jest nowy obrót twórcych sil.

Whatever you wanted remains
Behind; still, there are paths
You didn't follow.

où fus-tu où je toi voulais je suis
dans la foncé du jour seul

For months, then, nothing was heard from the eighteen-year-old poet; no amount of inquiry, however intrepid, however privileged, could discover any clue as to his whereabouts or current activities. Later we learned he had left the planet. Shortly after, Jordan Ligochee, who had been deeply hurt by his son's action, died.

Four years passed. Gradually rumors began: Barii had left Union, had left the system, had gone to Earth. We all smiled at the image of young Barii there on our dark, exhausted world, little believing that it could be true, that he was there, so far away, working among those empty defeated people. At which point the announcements arrived, easch one personally signed by Barii Volk and posted from Earth.

It is rumored that the Director of the Council of Arts, upon receiving his invitation, responded: "What the hell is a ballet?" (It is also rumored that he responded: "Where the hell is Earth?" But I believe we may safely put that down as apocryphal.) Perhaps so. At any rate, the response communicated, as well, his intention to attend.

In due course I received my own invitation and secured passage on one of the Earthbound wagons. At the suggestion of the magazine's editor I approached Barii for an interview, which, to our mutual surprise, was granted, it being arranged that I should meet him at the theatre in New Rome upon my arrival; this was to be the afternoon before the first performance of his ballet.

I found him just off the heart of the theatre, in a small room crowded with books and unfamiliar musical instruments. He was slumping on a couch, bent over a large six-stringed instrument, performing some minor adjustment while another, much older man – doubtless the musician – stood by waiting. Barii had put on weight in the past years, come to resemble less the skinny bird with which I'd compared him. Also, he had abandoned his familiar flamboyance of dress and was now attired in the plain, rough clothing I'd noticed on others about the theatre; but when, moments later, he looked up, I perceived again those familiar dark eyes, the sharp face, that quick and slightly mocking smile. His hair was gathered with a ribbon to one side of his head.

He must have heard my approach for, just as I lifted my hand to knock at the doorsill, he sprang from the chair and cmae striding toward me across the room. "James? I've followed your work with a great deal of interest and admiration. Your article on Arndto I found particularly helpful ... and your own Third Cycle, of course. I'm pleased to meet you at last; in fact, anticipation of that pleasure was the reason I responded so happily to your note about an interview."

I must admit that I was a bit surprised at his familiarity with my work, and with the esteem he afforded these small contributions of mine. I smiled and said, "I thought you should like the opportunity to talk about your new work, after these many years of silence."

"I would prefer to let the ballet speak for itself." He turned and held the instrument out to the waiting man: "Here, John, I think that should take care of it. If there's any further trouble, bring it back." The man came across the room and took the instrument. "John, this is James Sallis. He's come from Larne for our little performance. James – my concertmaster, John Bramin."

My face must have betrayed my mystery at the term, for Barii quickly smiled and explained: "The concertmaster is the first violin. The most important single member of the orchestra."

The man tucked the instrument under his arm, grinned, and walked away in a slow, stooping gait. Several others met him just outside the door and they walked off together, chattering. Something which had registered subliminally long ago suddenly sprang up to the front of my mind: that Barii, like the people here, was noticeably shorter than the rest of us.

"Please sit," Barii said. "And perhaps you would like to try some beer." He crossed to a shelf and brought back a large jar, the top of which he unscrewed and put aside, handing the jar over to me. It was half-filled with a yellow-brown liquid in which light swam and rolled. "Don't worry, it's quite sanitary. I produce it myself, in small quantities. That extra space is necessary to obtain full body and flavor: it should be just about right, now."

I accepted the jar and drank (the world was sudden, amber, in the brass-bright depth). It was heavy – fluid rather than liquid – with a sweet but somehow quite satisfying taste. I expressed my approval.

"I don't think I have it quite right yet, but it is refreshing, isn't it? One of the small pleasures we lost when we gave Earth up for dead."

We sat for several minutes talking of Larne and what the younger artists were engaged in there. I told Barii about the new odor symphonies, which owed so much to his early work, and spoke to him of Heinreid Flant, who seems to me the most brilliant and inspired of the new generation of energy sculptors. Barii inquired briefly about microsculpture, something with which he professed he had always wanted to work yet had never found the opportunity. "The journals always give a prejudiced view of what's really going on," he remarked, then flashed a grin, remembering the auspices under which I'd initially approached him.

"You called that instrument a violin," I finally asked, "Would you care to tell me more about it?"

For the next hour or so I was offered up what must surely be one of the most comprehensive surveys of musical history existent. Barii told me how he had traced the evolution of our own instruments backwards to the ones I would see utilized in the ballet later that night; how he had been forced to reconstruct the peculiar musical scale of ancient Earth then, from books and the memory of a few older Terrans, reconstruct the instruments around these concepts. "I have undoubtedly made many mistakes," he said at one point. "The violin for instance: should it have six strings tuned E-A-D-G-B-E, or four tuned E-A-D-G? I finally settled on six."

There was a light knock on the door and Barii sprang to his feet. It was a girl.

"Barii, I'm sorry to bother you, but there's a problem in the score. Movement Seven. The choreography and accompaniment are a little out of synch."

Barii took her hand and led her into the room. She was very young, smaller even than Barii, her hair short and colorless. She had huge green eyes. "Nonesense, Verity, you musn't always be apologizing. James: my leading lady, Verity. James Sallis, from the Lyric Quarterly. On Larne." She smiled and he squeezed her hand gently, turning her toward the door. "I'll be with you in a fewq minutes, darling. You musn't worry, everything will be all right."

She left, looking sadly down at the floor, and Barii continued his explanation, much of which I have reported in the second part of the presnet article. Frequently people came to the door with last-minute troubles and were politely turned away with assurances that he would be along soon, "they musn't worry." It was almost as though they resented, or were deeply saddened by my taking Barii away from them, even for a few moments. I kept trying to steer our conversation toward the ballet itself byt Barii resisted every attempt, mentioning only that the work was dedicated to his father.

Even when the reconstructed the scale and instruments, he went on, his work was far from finished. He had then to learn the Terran language perfectly ("It is incredibly idiosyncratic"); to make a deep study of Earth myth and legend; and to train his performers – to make artists of people who had sunk to a virtually pre-agricultural society. "I saw it as a moving outward," he intimated, "by returning to origins. I felt, I was sure, that a vitality existed here – a vitality I needed, and could make much use of. In the course of my study I discovered the ballet and I felt that here was the perfect medium for me: at once personal and formal. A pure lyricism, combining myth and language and music and motion ... plus a rigorous form. It was the end of all my previous work and, at the same time, possessed everything which that previous work had lacked."

He waved aside my objection to that final remark.

"I'm sorry, I just felt closed in. That I had exhausted the possibilities. This may have been the explanation for my perpatetic courting of artistic forms toward the end, before I left Larne. At least, that was my final decision, and I tried to make it clear in some translations I published anonymously. I was looking for something which I could never have found, something which no longer existed there. Here, I think, I found it."

Our conversation continued for some minutes, but I could get Barii to say no more about the ballet. Eventually I could see that he was tiring of our talk – becoming anxious to get out among his musicians – and excused myself, again expressing my anticipation of the performance which would be commencing in a few hours' time now.

Barii stood and shook the hair away from his face. He took my hands between his own.

"It's been truly wonderful to meet you, James," he said, looking into my eyes. "I hope you'll not be too terribly disappointed with our little ballet. I really hope that... Good-bye."

I took my leave and walked on the hills above the theatre to wait for the performance.

The sky was gray, impending, with streams of ochre and maroon on the horizon. Leaves like the husks of sigflees on Larne covered the hills, and I dimly understood that this was somehow the result of the "seasons" which Barii had mentioned in our conversation, though I found the concept basically impenetrable. Wind tumbled in the leaves as I walked among them. They crunched beneath my feet.

The ballet was titled Jordon, and was dedicated to Barii's father. Would it achieve the union of lyricism and formalism he hoped for? Had he found an answer to the exhaustion of our forms, found the vitality he wanted – or was his love for this world and its people blinding him, obscuring his critical senses, causing him to delude himself and accept mediocrity as vital? There had been clues, certain words in his conversation, certain gestures, which could indicate his awareness of the ballet's failure. But he placed great faith in it, had devoted so many years of his life...

These were the thoughts that crowded my mind as I walked alone on the hill through the leaves, all scarlet and mud-brown. The streams of color on the horizon were flattening, disappearing. There was a sense of dampness in the air and in my lungs, too, as I breathed.

I sat on the stump of a tree and looked down at the ramshackle theatre far below. As I watched, two tiny figures came out and looked up toward me. One raised his hand and waved; the other hesitated a moment then waved as well. They started off together away from the theatre and from me, holding hands.

The darkness, the dampness, was drawing closer around me. I sat on the hill for several minutes more, then went down to wait with the others for the opening of the ballet.