Wendy Kostora

Star Songs

“The stars sing to me,” said the old man.

“What?” I exclaimed. I must have dozed off because I had not noticed the dark-skinned man sitting next to me. In his lap was a guitar that probably had more mileage on it than my dad’s 1965 Volkswagen. He smelled of subway staleness, his clothes and hat tattered with neglect and time.

“I said the stars sing to me,” he said.

“Stars don’t sing,” I scoffed, holding my purse closer. The car was half-empty. I wished he had sat in another seat.

“Certainly they do. If you listen, you’ll know.” As if reflecting, he sighed. “Yep. I hear the stars. Each and every one, singing in its own harmony. They do that, you know.” He smiled, exposing teeth that looked like the aged ivory keys of a piano.

“You can’t hear stars. They are too far away. Anyhow, in space you can’t hear sound,” I added. Why did I respond to this old man? Now he wasn’t going to leave me alone to dread another workday in the slush pile of a large publishing company. As a low-level editor for a decade too long, I had grown tired of rejecting aspiring writers. I had considered resigning to find something more positive, more productive, maybe even to start my own company. However, with the recession on the loose, I dared not think of anything other than keeping my job.

The man’s dark eyes gleamed with wonderment. “Oh yes. If you listen hard enough, you can hear them.”

“Okay.” I said, hoping that, if I agree with him, he’d go bother someone else. “You can hear them.” I shifted closer to the window and faced the rushing darkness, a smear of lights streaking past. Hearing only silence and seeing a soft blur of stars in the window’s reflection, I smiled and started to sip my latte.

“Yep,” said the old man. He rubbed the frosted whiskers on his deep brown skin. “You know what they say?”

The cup almost slipped out of my hands, the hot liquid splattering all over my coat. “What!” I barked, shaken and annoyed.

“They sing of their children, the millions of other worlds floating in boundless oceans of galaxies, some young, some old like myself. All and all, they sing the ballads of the Many.”

“Sounds like something the great astronomer Carl Sagan would say,” I chided, pulling a tissue out of my purse.

Why had I only seen stars in the window? I thought.

As I dabbed at the liquid soaking into the fabric, an article about Superstrings that I had read in Physics Magazine came to mind. Proclaimed as the Everything, these small strands called Superstrings, resonating within matter, had united Einstein’s relativity, which he analogized as marble, to quantum mechanics, which he referred to as wood. In my own analogy, the old man was like the marble of relativity, his guitar the wood of quantum mechanics, and the guitar strings as Superstrings.

“You know of Carl?” he asked, sounding surprised.

“Well, of course I know of Carl. Who doesn’t? I’m sure everyone has seen his show, Cosmos. It aired not too long ago on PBS during their fund raising campaigns. I would have continued to watch except they kept interrupting, prodding me to make a pledge in trade for some dumb magazine or video.”

Why am I talking to this vagabond? Now that I had answered his questions, he’d never leave. I glanced at my watch. Had time slowed down? Twenty minutes—twenty and a half minutes before I would arrive at my stop. That was an eternity.

“Yes. I know what it means to lack patience,” the old man said. “When you’re without it, everything seems like an eternity. I know. I’ve been to eternity many times, never to return until I heard the stars.”

Here we go again, I thought, rolling my eyes. Who does this guy think he is—the Dalai Lama? “And what did they tell you?” I asked.

“Like I said, stories, billions of them. Not even a library of red giant proportions could fit them all on its shelves.”

“I can imagine,” I said, thinking this nut had obviously seen too many science-fiction movies.

“Imagine, yes, comprehend, no,” the old man said with reverence. “That library tells of many beings, their experiences written upon the paper of space and time. Each and every individual is significant, giving provenance to the Whole.”

“The Whole?”

“Yes.” He scratched his chin. “You see, civilization is where many individuals stand on common ground. They pull together for the benefit of the community, for the common good governed by rules given in faith. Any world builder knows that.”

I stared. “Are you a world builder?”

“Can a world be terra-formed to fit the environment of those who are terra-forming?”

“Well, I don’t know. Terra-forming is a bit beyond me,” I answered sarcastically.

The old man laughed like warm sweet butter. “The universe is teaming with intelligent life equal to and beyond our own. It contains species both resembling us and unlike us.”

I smirked. “So this is what the stars sing to you? This is what you hear?”

“Yes,” he said. “By hearing them I feel I’ve been out there. It’s enough for me to help discover and know of many civilizations. I also know the reason why they rise as well as fall. That is why I’m talking to you.” His tone became serious.

“Really?” I said certain that whatever he was about say was as ridiculous as his hearing the stars.

The old man nodded. His thick lips pulled down into a frown while the sparkle in his eyes faded. “I know about the Destroyer,” he whispered. “It’s here and has been in many places.”

“The Destroyer?”

“Yes. It lurks, waiting to rip into civilizations, disintegrate cities into walls of ash and dust, blind people with the mud of despair. The Destroyer’s weapon is the fire fueled by the hate conceived by deception.”

“Is this what the stars sing to you, about the Destroyer?”

“Yes,” he said soberly. “Just as particles aren’t without subatomic particles, good isn’t without evil. It’s because of villains that we have heroes.”

“Or archetypes,” I said, vexed. Now I understood—he was a writer intent on winning my influence with the publishing company. Unfortunately, I had no more ability to help him than I could hear his damn stars.

“Exactly,” he said, grinning.

The train slowed to a stop.

The old man’s smile faded. “Well, I guess we have finally arrived at our destination.”

“Yes, I suppose we have,” I said. Glad that what had seemed an eternity had come to an end, I gathered my belongings. “Well, it was nice talking with you,” I lied. After the other passengers cleared the aisle, he stood up. Afraid he would follow me, I remained in my seat.

“The stars sing to me,” he said as he walked away, his small yet majestic form exiting the train. Finally, certain that he was gone, I headed down the causeway and up the stairs.

For a moment, I stood on the sidewalk. The old man made of marble was nowhere in sight. Like the millions of musicians in New York City, he was perhaps already parked on some street corner, strumming his guitar—singing the blues of the stars. Passersby touched by his music would toss coins into his shabby hat.

Pushing the old man from my thoughts, I drifted along in the stream of soulless faces, but the music of his guitar, mixed with the city noise, haunted my mind. To listen, to find its source, I gazed up at the slice of sky dominated by the skyscrapers.

If the old man had heard the stars at this moment, he’d have to listen hard. Not only that, if the Destroyer did exist, it would have plenty of places to hide—places like the hearts of people grown as cold as a white dwarf star. Treating the man with such indifference, I knew my heart was just as frigid and dead.

With the music fading into the echo of distant jet engines carried by the wind, I plodded onward to my black-hole-of-a-job. Overhead, a high-pitched scream followed by a deafening roar drowned out the din of the city. Looking up I saw the side of one of the World Trade Center towers rupture into supernova, paper, glass, and ash spiraling to the ground. The smell of diesel fuel and smoke filled my nostrils.

Helpless, I stared as the Destroyer tore away the heart of civilization. My feet frozen to the ground, I stood motionless as the warriors of humanity ran forth to fight the chaos.