A brief interlude, a conversation I feel like having every day. If only I could find a Starling willing to listen to me...
A passage I really like reprinted without permission though my father did publish it once upon a time and it was edited by my friend and Jakov’s friend, Fred Jordan. From Soul of Wood, by Jakov Lind.
(He saw a starling hopping about under a tree, looking timidly around. So he told him:)
A miracle just happened to me. My name is Anton Barth. You don’t have to be afraid of me. I can talk, walk, and use my hands. I’m twenty years old. When I came into the world I was nothing but a head. All my life I couldn’t do anything but breathe, now I can talk. I can talk, Incredible. I can talk. See how I can move my fingers. I can bend down too. (Barth bent down and picked up a stick) It’s so easy. It’s natural for other people. But not for me. For me everything is a miracle. I am Anton Barth, totally paralyzed, given up by every doctor in the world. Hopeless, they said. I was born with nothing but a head, the rest was useless. The rest of me was a rotten, dried up nut. I could only scream and stammer. All I had was thoughts and a mouth and eyes. If my parents could see now. But it’s too late. They’re gone. You should have known my parents. In the last few years trouble made them religious. My father is a doctor. From Odessa. All his life he was an atheist. When the specialist from New York gave me up, they sent for the wonder-working rabbi of Kishinev, he came in an aeroplane. The New York doctor was interested in me as a medical case-history, he wanted my head for his university. The rabbi said to my mother: a child like yours won’t have an easy time of it; in other respects he is sound. May the Almighty protect him. Then he went back to Kishinev.
Even at birth I was an embarrassment to everybody, especially my parents. My relatives didn’t know whether to congratulate my parents, whether it was the right thing to do; they didn’t even insist on having me circumcised. It didn’t matter in my case.
I was a sensation in the papers. People made bets about me. Can Barth’s head live another twenty-four hours? At first the doctors said four hours at the most. The bets ran to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Some of the bettors were wiped out. But I lived.
When I was five, my neck grew, when I was six, my shoulders, when I was seven, my right and left arm; By the time I was nine I had hands. Barth has hands, the newspapers screamed. They sold standing room outside my windows. But then things happened quickly; within eight months my body, legs and feet grew. On my twelfth birthday they put out special editions in my honour. Just three words: BARTH IS COMPLETE. There was a scandal. Nobody believed my parents and nobody believed the doctors either, and the papers began to insult each other. Nobody was willing to believe I could really be complete.
A certain Hermann Wohlbrecht, a veteran from the first war with a wooden leg, a skilled carpenter who earned a living doing small repairs, became my nurse. He had to look after me day and night. Yes, I was complete, all right, but all there was of me was paralyzed. This morning Wohlbrecht went away. I don’t think he’ll come back.
But I don’t need him any more, I’ll stay up here, I like it here. Wohlbrecht has done his share. He saved my life.
(The Starling had long since flown away)