BRUTUS

Caelum drifted to a window with half open shutters and looked inside. At a table sat a large man gnawing at a chunk of meat with his hands and teeth while a bony woman in a bonnet and three small children with dirty, wishful faces looked on.

“Children be good. Let papa eat and share what he can. Times are tough, so he needs his strength for another day of labor.”

“Chomp, chomp, chomp, gulp,” chewed and nodded the father, and then he tore off more with his teeth. “Nawt a peep from any of yous,” he growled with bulging cheeks and smacking mouth dripping spittle. After a few more bites, he spat a piece of gristle into the middle of the table. All at once, six grimy little hands lunged for it.

Caelum found the scene curious. He could not understand a word, but he wondered, “What it is like to eat flesh? Do they eat one another, or a different kind of beast?”

The pondering god continued gliding along. With great curiosity he peered through one window after the next:

Through one, there sat an old man and a woman trying to play cards but arguing instead.

“You damn, cheating old woman!”

“You foolish, gray fart!”

“I should trade you in for mule!”

“I’d rather sleep with a broom!”

“And I know where you can stick it!”

Through another pair of shutters, two children, a boy and a girl, were kneeling over a bed, hands clasped and heads down, their wet-faced mother standing in the doorway with a lantern.

“Now before I blow out the lamp, be good and say your prayers.”

The little girl answered,

“Caelum, Lord of the Four Winds, the Heaven, and the Sky, please see daddy home from war. Please blow air into his ship’s sails so he gets back really fast, so we can hug and kiss him again... …and just one more thing. Please help mommy stop crying all night. Amen.”

Mommy started crying aloud, blew out the lamp and disappeared down the hall. The children climbed into bed.

Caelum drifted on, wondering what he had witnessed. Were the small ones offering supplication to the larger one and their reverence had moved her to tears? If only he understood the meaning of their sounds.

With a turn down one avenue, then into an alleyway, he was then led to yet another window. From it came strange sounds, a seeming mixture of joy with pain. When he peeked through a crack in the curtains, he found a naked woman straddling a man. She was grinding her hips into him while striking his face with her pendulous breasts.

“Yes! Like that!”

“Oh baby!”

“Don’t stop!”

“Oh baby!”

Were they fighting? Perhaps the victor would eat the other? Or was this a bonding ritual?

Having witnessed so many scenes that night, Caelum decided it was time to leave the ground for the softness of clouds, and ponder it all in silence. However, just before he made his ascension, the pitter-patter of paws on cobblestone caught his ears. A mangy dog appeared around the corner, and it was carrying a dead crow in its mouth. The animal was prancing; holding its head high, and its tail was wagging.

This shocked the Lord of the Four Winds, the Heaven, and the Sky. It made him very angry. 

“This beast of the dust has murdered a winged child of the wind!”