Miguel Fliguer's Blog - Posts Tagged "seder"
The Feastival - A Lovecraftian Passover story
This is an excerpt from Cooking With Lovecraft: Supernatural Horror In The Kitchen by Miguel Fliguer, available in paperback and Kindle here.
I was far from home, and the spell of the Black Sea was upon me. In the twilight I fancied I heard it pounding on the rocks, even when the coast was several miles away. And my fathers had called me to the old shtetl beyond, which laid just over the hill where the twisting willows writhed against the clearing sky and the first stars of evening. I pushed on through the shallow, new-fallen snow along the road that soared lonely up to where Aldebaran twinkled among the trees; on toward the very ancient shtetl I had never seen but often dreamed of.
It was the Passover, that some men call Easter though they know in their hearts it is older than Bethlehem and Jerusalem. It was the Passover, and I had come at last to the ancient village where my people had dwelt and kept the festival in the elder time when festival was forbidden; where also they had commanded their sons to keep festival once every year, that the memory of slavery and deliverance might not be forgotten. Mine were an old people, and were old even when the Greeks settled this land twenty-six centuries ago and named it Odyssos. And my people were strange, because they spoke another tongue before they learnt the tongue of the original settlers.
And now we were scattered, after centuries of pogroms and gas chambers and persecution; and while many had found safe haven in that tiny sliver of Middle East sands, and others in the far Western lands from whence I came, just a few of us still kept the rituals of mysteries that few could understand. I was the only one who came back that night to the old shtetl as legend bade, for only the poor and the lonely remember.
Then at the hill’s crest I saw Odessa in the distance, outspreading frostily in the gloaming, and the Black Sea shores behind the city; but I didn’t stop because the hour was getting late. I looked down at the foot of the hill and saw the snowy roofs and the labyrinth of crooked streets of the shtetl; and small-paned windows gleaming out in the cold dusk to join Orion and the archaic stars. And I knew I had arrived to my ancestral home.
As the road wound down the slope, I listened for the merry sounds of a village at evening, but did not hear them. I had seen an old map of the shtetl, and I knew where to find the home of my people. It was told that I should be known and welcomed; so I hastened through the road and turned left on the second intersection after the public well. The old map still held good, and I had no trouble. I was glad I had chosen to walk, for the village had seemed very beautiful from the hill; and now I was eager to knock at the door of my people, the second house on the right on that snowy street, with a small wooden outhouse on the side and a quaint garden in the front. Though it pleased me, I would have relished it better if there had been footprints in the snow, and people in the streets.
There were lights inside the house when I came upon it. When I knocked at the door I was half afraid. Some fear had been gathering in me, perhaps because of the strangeness of my heritage, and the bleakness of the evening, and the queerness of the silence in that aged town. And when my knock was answered I was afraid, because I had not heard any footsteps before the door creaked open. But I was not afraid long, for the slippered old man in the doorway had a familiar air that reassured me; and he pronounced the ancient welcoming formula of my people, and when I answered with the traditional reply in the old tongue, he smiled warmly.
He beckoned me into the dining room, lit by many candles in handsome silver holders. A table was already set for three, covered in a beautiful white linen tablecloth; it was clear they had been waiting for me to begin with the rites. I saw a doorway leading to a kitchen, from whence came a wonderful aroma, and an old woman standing by the stove greeted me with a smile and apologized for not coming, because she was very busy with dinner preparations. All our conversation took place in the old tongue of my greatparents; a tongue I had never spoken before, yet it flowed from my lips like wine.
The old man took my coat, and we cleaned our hands in a beautiful old washbowl; and we covered our heads, and the old couple did the blessings and broke the ritual flatbread; and we left the house door ajar as it was the custom; and by turns they narrated the ancient story of deliverance, reading from an antique, leather bound book written in another, even older tongue; and they sang the old songs, and I sang with them. I am not a young man, yet I was the youngest at the table; so I sang the traditional questions that the children of our people asked their elders in the old days, and the old couple sang in reply. And the ritual continued and the face of that old man shewed joy; and the old woman gazed at him in adoration; and we smiled at each other as we chanted.
And the old woman brought dinner saucers to the table, rejecting our help with a smile… A heaping plate of fragrant baked chicken thighs and breasts; a delicate white bowl of chicken soup of intoxicating aroma, with spheres of the mystical matzhoh powder floating inside; and the crown jewel of that magnificent repast… a loaf of that immemorial stuffed fish of which I had heard my grandfather speak in awe.
And as the night grew we relished on that toothsome meal, and the old couple reminisced about the ancient times of their youth, and I told stories of the Western land that was my home. The baked chicken was mouth-watering; the soup was magnificent and the old woman beamed as I helped myself of a second serving; but the stuffed fish was pure perfection… a marvel of simplicity and flavor that after the first bite transported me to an otherworldy realm of sensations.
And after the feast we sang more melodies from that leather-bound volume; and the old man opened the front door and we all stood in the small garden in silence, watching the crystal-clear night sky and smiling in content at each other.
And then we returned inside, and the old man brewed perfumed cups of tea in a beautifully engraved bronze samovar; and I thanked them for their hospitality and for that dinner fit for a king; and I made special compliments about that delicious stuffed fish. And the old couple graciously accepted my compliments; and we kept talking in that strange, melodic tongue of my ancestors that I hadn’t spoken ever before or since.
And when I felt tired, and said that I should leave, the old couple had none of it; and presently they beckoned me to a small room where they had already made a quaint, comfortable bed; and I took my boots off and laid on those lavender-scented sheets, and said good-night to that old couple that smiled at me from the doorway; and soon I was drifting into a peaceful, contented sleep without dreams.
A strange noise startled me. I blinked and looked around, and realized I was laying on the grass of a pasture field, with a few cows roaming nearby. The sun was up and there was no trace of the old couple, the house, or the shtetl. I guessed fatigue had overcome me the night before, and I had fell asleep at that grass field. And I felt sad, because my dream was the most beautiful I ever had, and I longed for the company of the old couple.
I got up, wore my boots and my coat, oriented myself and started walking towards the hill in the direction of Odessa.
And when I reached the top of the hill, and saw Odessa in the distance, a cold wind gust made me put my hands in my coat pockets, and there I found a folded piece of paper; and I unfolded it and saw scribbles in what I recognized as the old tongue of my people; but I could not read it.
And I meditated about it as I walked towards Odessa; and when I arrived there, I went to a coffee place and searched the Internet for the meaning of those old characters; and realized the scribbles were the stuffed fish recipe, that the old woman from my dream had left in my coat pocket, as a parting gift from her world that is no more.
---
I was far from home, and the spell of the Black Sea was upon me. In the twilight I fancied I heard it pounding on the rocks, even when the coast was several miles away. And my fathers had called me to the old shtetl beyond, which laid just over the hill where the twisting willows writhed against the clearing sky and the first stars of evening. I pushed on through the shallow, new-fallen snow along the road that soared lonely up to where Aldebaran twinkled among the trees; on toward the very ancient shtetl I had never seen but often dreamed of.
It was the Passover, that some men call Easter though they know in their hearts it is older than Bethlehem and Jerusalem. It was the Passover, and I had come at last to the ancient village where my people had dwelt and kept the festival in the elder time when festival was forbidden; where also they had commanded their sons to keep festival once every year, that the memory of slavery and deliverance might not be forgotten. Mine were an old people, and were old even when the Greeks settled this land twenty-six centuries ago and named it Odyssos. And my people were strange, because they spoke another tongue before they learnt the tongue of the original settlers.
And now we were scattered, after centuries of pogroms and gas chambers and persecution; and while many had found safe haven in that tiny sliver of Middle East sands, and others in the far Western lands from whence I came, just a few of us still kept the rituals of mysteries that few could understand. I was the only one who came back that night to the old shtetl as legend bade, for only the poor and the lonely remember.
Then at the hill’s crest I saw Odessa in the distance, outspreading frostily in the gloaming, and the Black Sea shores behind the city; but I didn’t stop because the hour was getting late. I looked down at the foot of the hill and saw the snowy roofs and the labyrinth of crooked streets of the shtetl; and small-paned windows gleaming out in the cold dusk to join Orion and the archaic stars. And I knew I had arrived to my ancestral home.
As the road wound down the slope, I listened for the merry sounds of a village at evening, but did not hear them. I had seen an old map of the shtetl, and I knew where to find the home of my people. It was told that I should be known and welcomed; so I hastened through the road and turned left on the second intersection after the public well. The old map still held good, and I had no trouble. I was glad I had chosen to walk, for the village had seemed very beautiful from the hill; and now I was eager to knock at the door of my people, the second house on the right on that snowy street, with a small wooden outhouse on the side and a quaint garden in the front. Though it pleased me, I would have relished it better if there had been footprints in the snow, and people in the streets.
There were lights inside the house when I came upon it. When I knocked at the door I was half afraid. Some fear had been gathering in me, perhaps because of the strangeness of my heritage, and the bleakness of the evening, and the queerness of the silence in that aged town. And when my knock was answered I was afraid, because I had not heard any footsteps before the door creaked open. But I was not afraid long, for the slippered old man in the doorway had a familiar air that reassured me; and he pronounced the ancient welcoming formula of my people, and when I answered with the traditional reply in the old tongue, he smiled warmly.
He beckoned me into the dining room, lit by many candles in handsome silver holders. A table was already set for three, covered in a beautiful white linen tablecloth; it was clear they had been waiting for me to begin with the rites. I saw a doorway leading to a kitchen, from whence came a wonderful aroma, and an old woman standing by the stove greeted me with a smile and apologized for not coming, because she was very busy with dinner preparations. All our conversation took place in the old tongue of my greatparents; a tongue I had never spoken before, yet it flowed from my lips like wine.
The old man took my coat, and we cleaned our hands in a beautiful old washbowl; and we covered our heads, and the old couple did the blessings and broke the ritual flatbread; and we left the house door ajar as it was the custom; and by turns they narrated the ancient story of deliverance, reading from an antique, leather bound book written in another, even older tongue; and they sang the old songs, and I sang with them. I am not a young man, yet I was the youngest at the table; so I sang the traditional questions that the children of our people asked their elders in the old days, and the old couple sang in reply. And the ritual continued and the face of that old man shewed joy; and the old woman gazed at him in adoration; and we smiled at each other as we chanted.
And the old woman brought dinner saucers to the table, rejecting our help with a smile… A heaping plate of fragrant baked chicken thighs and breasts; a delicate white bowl of chicken soup of intoxicating aroma, with spheres of the mystical matzhoh powder floating inside; and the crown jewel of that magnificent repast… a loaf of that immemorial stuffed fish of which I had heard my grandfather speak in awe.
And as the night grew we relished on that toothsome meal, and the old couple reminisced about the ancient times of their youth, and I told stories of the Western land that was my home. The baked chicken was mouth-watering; the soup was magnificent and the old woman beamed as I helped myself of a second serving; but the stuffed fish was pure perfection… a marvel of simplicity and flavor that after the first bite transported me to an otherworldy realm of sensations.
And after the feast we sang more melodies from that leather-bound volume; and the old man opened the front door and we all stood in the small garden in silence, watching the crystal-clear night sky and smiling in content at each other.
And then we returned inside, and the old man brewed perfumed cups of tea in a beautifully engraved bronze samovar; and I thanked them for their hospitality and for that dinner fit for a king; and I made special compliments about that delicious stuffed fish. And the old couple graciously accepted my compliments; and we kept talking in that strange, melodic tongue of my ancestors that I hadn’t spoken ever before or since.
And when I felt tired, and said that I should leave, the old couple had none of it; and presently they beckoned me to a small room where they had already made a quaint, comfortable bed; and I took my boots off and laid on those lavender-scented sheets, and said good-night to that old couple that smiled at me from the doorway; and soon I was drifting into a peaceful, contented sleep without dreams.
A strange noise startled me. I blinked and looked around, and realized I was laying on the grass of a pasture field, with a few cows roaming nearby. The sun was up and there was no trace of the old couple, the house, or the shtetl. I guessed fatigue had overcome me the night before, and I had fell asleep at that grass field. And I felt sad, because my dream was the most beautiful I ever had, and I longed for the company of the old couple.
I got up, wore my boots and my coat, oriented myself and started walking towards the hill in the direction of Odessa.
And when I reached the top of the hill, and saw Odessa in the distance, a cold wind gust made me put my hands in my coat pockets, and there I found a folded piece of paper; and I unfolded it and saw scribbles in what I recognized as the old tongue of my people; but I could not read it.
And I meditated about it as I walked towards Odessa; and when I arrived there, I went to a coffee place and searched the Internet for the meaning of those old characters; and realized the scribbles were the stuffed fish recipe, that the old woman from my dream had left in my coat pocket, as a parting gift from her world that is no more.
---
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