Talking Skeletons

Turgenev called this little horror story a "poem in prose." Listen if you dare. 

THE SKULLS

ByIvan Turgenev

Translatedby Gordon Grice

 

Thehall’s ablaze with candle and chandelier, with ladies in lace, with men sleekand polished. Banter; brilliant faces. That face, in particular—I’ve seen heron the stage. They’re telling her how great she was last night, but they don’thave the words to paint her heartbreak voice.

            Suddenly the brilliant faces slough.Each skin, delicate as the scum on milk, slides down—only a little blood beneathto grease its way. The skulls gleam forth, their hollows blue as lead. Even thepink meat of the gums is gone, flowing down, the teeth left naked to thesockets.

            The jaws talk on. Lamplight glitterson the planes of naked faces. Each globe of bone retains its jellied eyeballs,rolling with the rhythm of the witticisms. Don’t they see what’s happened?

            There’s a mirror on the wall. Ican’t face it.

            The skulls talk on. One cocks itselfsarcastically, and I glimpse the red rag of a tongue. One bobs agreement;another rocks itself back to laugh, and I see its tongue in full, rippling likea muscular slug.

            My hand wants to creep to my face,to find out. I don’t dare.

            The grins seem bigger without themuscle and meat, but the talk remains the same. How great the famous face waslast night! Her singing caught them at the heart. Her music will last forever,some skull says, and others nod.

 

      

Haven't supped full of anatomical horrors yet? Here's Theodore Roethke's chilling contemplation of life in the flesh, Epidermal Macabre.