‘Yew’

Leah Oates has B.F.A. from the Rhode Island School of Design, an M.F.A. from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is a Fulbright Fellow for study at Edinburgh College of Art in Scotland.  Oates has had solo shows at Black Cat Artspace, Susan Eley Fine Art, The Central Park Arsenal Gallery, Real Art Ways, The Brooklyn Public Library and at the MTA Arts and Design Lightbox Project. Oates has been in group shows in Toronto at the Gallery 1313, Propeller Gallery, Gladstone Hotel, Arta Gallery, John. Aird Gallery and Papermill Gallery.  Oates has been in numerous group shows in the NYC area at Wave Hill, Edward Hopper House, Chashama, WAH Center, Metaphor Contemporary Art, Denise Bibro Fine Art, Nurture Art Gallery and The Pen and Brush Gallery. http://www.leahoates.com

Yew

A breeze tickled bare feet abandoned by their blanket

The window wasn’t open before
unless she had forgotten

Forgotten to close it?
impossible
forgetting was something she had forgotten how to do

A breeze pushed the strands across her face and into her mouth
She turned, tucked her feet beneath the covers, and allowed the loving arms of Sleep to
embrace her once more

Light
Light expanded in a ring as if an angel had decided that she should sleep no longer

The chill draped over her like a poncho left in the car overnight as she sat up straight in bed

The room has become so frigid
Perhaps the heater broke

The room had not turned cold, however

as there was no room to turn any temperature whatsoever

Eyes darted left and right and up and down and left again then straight ahead and down to
ensure the existence of the bed and back to the right

Nothing but eyes moved for minutes

hours

days

The gaze wandered from tree
to
tree

Trees?

yes trees.
yew trees.

yew trees in a ring not unlike the light that continued to radiate behind her eyelids, only
visible when she blinked

The space within the tree ring was void of all life, save for the fallen needles that were
decaying beneath layers upon layers of their brethren and - of course - her

They do make for quite comfortable flooring

Perhaps soon she too would decay like the needles
Slowly rotting away, previously supple flesh drying and cracking as it stretches across
muscle-less bones

Perhaps I will wait until tomorrow to decay
It feels like an awful lot of work to do right now

She nudged herself off the bed and pressed her feet into the springy bed of needles that
threatened to stab her delicate arches if she stepped incorrectly.
A small spider skittered a c r o s s the top of her right foot, which her eyes
f o l l o w e d with enthusiasm

Why hello, friend

The spider stopped, now appearing like a poorly-done tattoo of a star just
below her big toe

no
it was a tattoo...

Has that always been there?

But she blinked
And the tattoo was a spider once again
Or perhaps not

It was buried beneath her skin like a tattoo would be, as if it were ink that had come to life

s h i f t i n g and w g l n

i g i g across her big toe’s knuckle

Oh poor thing...
Perhaps I have a fly to gift you

She patted her hips and backside, but her nightgown had no pockets,
and no pockets meant no flies

Upon seeing her lack of foodstuffs, the spider continued on,
peeling himself from under her skin,
burying himself in the yew needles

Left foot forward – (be careful of the spider, do not crush him)
Right foot back - no - forward

Oh! A mushroom!

The small white bulb stuck out from beneath the floor, perched on a thin white stem
It may as well have been an oasis in a desert, glimmering in the faint light of the moon among
an arid sea of sand
And, on cue, her stomach grumbled, begging her to pluck the mushroom away from its home
in the needles

She reached to it and grasped the stem
All it took was a light pinch and the mushroom sat in the palm of her hand, rolling gently
back and forth as she examined it for any blemishes

it rolled
rolled
rolled

and on the fourth roll its wings unfolded, and a pure white butterfly perched itself on her
fingertips

How delightful!
I needn’t any food when I have such company

So she and the butterfly sat, kneeling on the cushion of needles
She shared her thoughts on the ever-important milkweed plant, and the butterfly argued that
asters were not only a much better source of nectar, but far more lovely than a milkweed of all
things

The mushroom-butterfly soon flew away, having tired of conversations regarding the benefits
of various flowers and vegetables

She again kneeled in the needles for quite some time

For how long?

Only God knows

She reached her hand beneath the yew and clutched a handful of the dead and dying

As she allowed them to

f
a
l
l

her hand went with them
having become needles itself

That wasn’t nearly as difficult as I had expected
How strange it is

To feel nothing where my hand once was
I can almost still bend the fingers

It was then that she realized that everything from her feet to her knees had become a lovely
pile of freshly-fallen yew needles that her thighs sat upon like a throne
with the support of her lower legs having become a long-lost memory, she resorted to laying
on her back, examining the stub of her arm that was not quite flesh

Needles poked their way through the skin of her wrist

Where did the needles stop
Where did the flesh begin

Flesh-colored needles, needle-colored flesh
An arm that was all but an entire branch of a tree

Bark for flesh
Needles for flesh
Flesh for wood
Flesh
Flesh

Wasn’t that a word just a moment ago?

She lifted herself up onto the stubs her knees had abandoned and, upon trying to shuffle her
way to another mushroom

Butterfly?
she saw in the distance, found that the stubs had become stumps

Bark became flesh once more

Rooted to the ground
Prepared to grow

I sure hope I will make a lovely tree

She turned her gaze to the sky,
recognizing for the first time just how bright the stars were in the center of the ring of trees
The moon sat directly above her, and she felt like a movie star with a spotlight that would
follow her anywhere... if she could move, of course

The stars brightened, glowing more and more until they blocked out the moon completely,
forming a heavenly ring of light that enveloped her in a delicate hug

she y
r e a c h e d k
her arm to the s

to embrace the warmth of the stars

and that’s how her arm stayed
for all of eternity
as a branch of a yew tree
that stood in the center
of twelve others that came before

Before?
Yes, before
Where did you come from
It does not matter anymore
What matters is
What happens
From here on out
Yew belong
With us
Yew are here
Forever
Welcome home

Audrey Hall is a third-year at the University of Utah studying English and French. She has been writing since childhood and has recently developed an interest in experimenting with formatting as a means of storytelling.