Dammyr
Victoria Kielland
Original title: Dammyr
Publisher: No Comprendo Press, 2016
Pages: 127 pages
Aurora wanders the streets of Dammyr—an industrial area along the tracks in Fredrikstad named after its watery marshes, or dammyr—in search of her own heart. Through the fog and the twilight and steaming manhole covers, she drifts through forest and archipelago, past silos and busstops, along the entire Glomma River and the promenade along the pier, farther and farther out to Hvaler, all the way at the Swedish border. The wind whispers through the cracks in the window frames; feet balance along the edge of the Fredrikstad Bridge, fire licks at the roofs, the knife slips deeper into the flesh, an echo bursts through her body, but the only thing Aurora can find is the gentle song in her breast: don’t push love too far. Aurora wanders out to the forest and its three ponds, up to the cliff and the red-flecked rocks; wind slices into her ear and the marsh landscape covers all of Østfold. In the endless expanse of the plains, something is always getting lost between voice and body, between thrill and obsession, between the hand and the shoulderblade before the hand strikes the face, between faith, hope, and love.
