Free Elephant Bangs Train by William Kotzwinkle

brilliant birds, to their paradise, where she reclined on a couch in the heaven of her lover. It is for the secret of your illusions that I love you , she said, as they floated through triangles.
    She heard the music of the conch horn, bells, and he, on a platform, thousand-eyed, revealed himself to her as he truly was, and he was, in fact, invisible. No , she said, I must have you , and there, she saw to her relief, he was the swan and she his lake. These, my true regions , he whispered, and became the lotus floating, then the toad.
    '. . . this perilous operation, learned in Cairo. . . .' He closed the lid, sat on the box. Glancing backstage through the curtains and cables, he saw his wife, smiling at him from the wings. Yes, he thought, I'm in a bit of a mess. Sweating coldly, he looked down at the box, inside of which his subject lay sleeping.
    And who am I? she asked, dissolving into this life, that life, here, there, palaces and so forth, and then, satisfied that she was eternal, she relaxed, recognizing from the heights: She was no one.
    He began to saw.
    She heard the slow beating of a drum, saw the jungle, wild plumage. Her body covered in gold fur, she beheld him seated across from her, in the door of a mountain cave, licking his great paw, ferocious, her king, winking at her.
    'It is not often I perform this feat for fear of arrest,' said the magician. 'However, since we are at the end of town . . .' The teeth ripped through the box and sawdust flew in the air.
    Back, back, she was gone, more was coming. They were clumsy dragons, loving in lost swamps. His long neck, green skin, ponderable his tail, and her strange egg: The night was pterodactyl, sharp-beaked, she was afraid. Somewhere, she thought, I was a girl.
    'I will now ask the gentleman in the front row, that is right, you sir, to come up and examine the depth of the incision I have made in this box.' The magician leaned confidently on the box, inside of which the saw was deeply inserted.
    The camel will take us away , he whispered, and turning, she saw a kneeling sad-eyed beast. Lifting her silken robe, white, embroidered with dragons, she climbed up to the cab atop the camel's back, where sat the magician, smiling, clad in the cloak of the desert. Slowly the beast stood and walked, like the rocking of waves.
    'Very well, my good man,' said the magician, 'if you are satisfied that no chicanery is being offered here, I shall proceed.'
    Across the night sand they rode, beneath the lonely heavens, he silent, she in prayer, until they came to an oasis, around which a fierce tribe had gathered, and he was their chief. She descended amid the animals and the oil lamps. Attended by his other wives, she was taken into an arabesque tent. A rug was spread, pillows, their dinner, dates, wine. She listened to voices outside their tent talking of battle and it thrilled her.
    'Observe: The torso is separated from the legs.'
    She was his tenth wife, bore him a son, lived a life of precious price in Bagdad, died an old woman, was buried in a jewelled ebony box. Death was dark and impossible, the coffin opened. He stood over it, in a faded tuxedo, beckoning to her. 'You're back,' he said.
    She stepped out, weakly, on to the smoky stage. People were clapping dully. The room was spinning. She fell into his arms. 'Never leave me,' she whispered.
    He bowed, took her by the hand. The stage was bending. Her legs were trembling and she could not feel her feet. Slowly, he led her towards the stairs. Yes, she thought, he's taking me away.
    'Goodbye,' he said. The spotlight blinded her. She turned away and saw behind him on the stage a piece of scenery—a balcony window above a courtyard. She stared down a pathway in the painted garden, to the sea, and the white sail of a passing ship. 'Take me away,' she said.
    'Impossible,' he said, his face pale and drawn.
    She turned to the stairs with trepidation, for they were moving, as if alive. 'I thought I was a young girl,' she said, warily