Margaret Atwood - Good Bones

The Author

MARGARET ATWOOD was born in Ottawa, Ontario, in 1939. During her childhood she spent many summers in the bush country of northern Ontario and Quebec. Upon graduation from the University of Toronto in 1961, she took her masters degree from Radcliffe College the following year and went on to pursue doctoral studies at Harvard University.

Novelist and poet, critic and editor, Atwood is one of the most prolific and important writers of contemporary literature. Equally acclaimed as a writer of both fiction and poetry, she devotes much of her creative energy to giving literary shape to the aspirations, fears, and foibles of her society. Her many honours include the Governor Generals Award for Poetry, the Governor Generals Award for Fiction, the Los Angeles Times Fiction Award, the Giller Prize for Fiction, the Booker Prize, and several honorary degrees.

Margaret Atwood resides in Toronto, Ontario.

THE NEW CANADIAN LIBRARY

General Editor: David Staines

ADVISORY BOARD
Alice Munro
W.H. New
Guy Vanderhaeghe

Copyright 1992 by O.W. Toad Ltd.
Afterword copyright 1997 by Rosemary Sullivan

First published in 1992 by Coach House Press
New Canadian Library edition 1997

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency is an infringement of the copyright law.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Atwood, Margaret, 1939
Good bones

(New Canadian library)
eISBN: 978-1-55199-550-2

I. Title. II. Series

PS8501.T86G86 1997 C813.54 C97-930816-x
PR9199.3.A88G86 1997

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporations Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

McClelland & Stewart Ltd.
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www.mcclelland.com/NCL

v3.1

The following dedication appeared in the original edition:

For G., as always, and for the two Angelas

Contents

Bad News

T HE RED GERANIUMS fluorescing on the terrace, the wind swaying the daisies, the babys milk-fed eyes focusing for the first time on a double row of beloved teeth what is there to report? Bloodlessness puts her to sleep. She perches on a rooftop, her brass wings folded, her head with its coiffure of literate serpents tucked beneath the left one, snoozing like a noon pigeon. Theres nothing to do but her toenails. The sun oozes across the sky, the breezes undulate over her skin like warm silk stockings, her heart beats with the systole and diastole of waves on the breakwater, boredom creeps over her like vines.

She knows what she wants: an event, by which she means a slip of the knife, a dropped wineglass or bomb, something broken. A little acid, a little gossip, a little hi-tech megadeath: a sharp thing that will wake her up. Run a tank over the geraniums, turn the wind up to hurricane so the daisies heads tear off and hurtle through the air like bullets, drop the baby from the balcony and watch the mother swan-dive after him, with her snarled Ophelia hair and addled screams.

The melon-burst, the tomato-coloured splatter now thats a story! Shes awake now, she sniffs the air, her wings are spread for flight. Shes hungry, shes on the track, shes howling like a siren and shes got your full attention.

No news is good news, everyone knows that. You know it, too, and you like it that way. When youre feeling bad she scratches at your window, and you let her in. Better them than you , she whispers in your ear. You settle back in your chair, folding the rustling paper.

The Little Red Hen Tells All

E VERYONE WANTS IN on it. Everyone! Not just the cat, the pig and the dog. The horse too, the cow, the rhinoceros, the orang-outang, the horn-toad, the wombat, the duckbilled platypus, you name it. Theres no peace any more and all because of that goddamn loaf of bread.

Its not easy, being a hen.

You know my story. Probably you had it told to you as a shining example of how you yourself ought to behave. Sobriety and elbow-grease. Do it yourself. Then invest your capital. Then collect. Im supposed to be an illustration of that? Dont make me laugh.

I found the grain of wheat, true. So what? There are lots of grains of wheat lying around. Keep your eyes to the grindstone and you could find a grain of wheat, too. I saw one and picked it up. Nothing wrong with that. Finders keepers. A grain of wheat saved is a grain of wheat earned. Opportunity is bald behind.

Who will help me plant this grain of wheat? I said. Who? Who? I felt like a goddamn owl.

Not me, not me , they replied. Then Ill do it myself , I said, as the nun quipped to the vibrator. Nobody was listening, of course. Theyd all gone to the beach.

Dont think it didnt hurt, all that rejection. Brooding in my nest of straw, I cried little red hen tears. Tears of chicken blood. You know what that looks like, youve eaten enough of it. Makes good gravy.

So, what were my options? I could have eaten that grain of wheat right away. Done myself a nutritional favour. But instead I planted it. Watered it. Stood guard over it night and day with my little feathered body.

So it grew. Why not? So it made more grains of wheat. So I planted those. So I watered those. So I ground them into flour. So I finally got enough for a loaf of bread. So I baked it. Youve seen the pictures, me in my little red hen apron, holding the loaf with its plume of aroma in between the tips of my wings, smiling away. I smile in all the pictures, as much as you can smile, with a beak. Whenever they said Not me , I smiled. I never lost my temper.

Who will help me eat this loaf of bread? I said. I will , said the cat, the dog and the pig. I will , said the antelope. I will , said the yak. I will , said the five-lined skink. I will , said the pubic louse. They meant it, too. They held out their paws, hooves, tongues, claws, mandibles, prehensile tails. They drooled at me with their eyes. They whined. They shoved petitions through my mail slot. They became depressed. They accused me of selfishness. They developed symptoms. They threatened suicide. They said it was my fault, for having a loaf of bread when they had none. Every single one of them, it seemed, needed that goddamn loaf of bread more than I did.

You can bake more , they said.

So then what? I know what the story says, what Im supposed to have said: Ill eat it myself, so kiss off . Dont believe a word of it. As Ive pointed out, Im a hen, not a rooster.

Here , I said. I apologize for having the idea in the first place. I apologize for luck. I apologize for self-denial. I apologize for being a good cook. I apologize for that crack about nuns. I apologize for that crack about roosters. I apologize for smiling, in my smug hen apron, with my smug hen beak. I apologize for being a hen .

Have some more .

Have mine .

Gertrude Talks Back

I ALWAYS THOUGHT it was a mistake, calling you Hamlet. I mean, what kind of a name is that for a young boy? It was your fathers idea. Nothing would do but that you had to be called after him. Selfish. The other kids at school used to tease the life out of you. The nicknames! And those terrible jokes about pork.