Young MachinesThe Fireside Fables

Part One

The First Courtesy

“The first courtesy,” said the storyteller, “is to look carefully at what is actually in front of you. Looking will not answer every question. It will give you better ones.”

A girl kneels on the beach and reaches towards a smooth grey box on the tideline. Two gulls fly over the bay, with stone cottages behind.Fable 1The Locked Box
A wooden broom with blue bindings sweeps wood shavings by itself through a patch of sunlight in a carpenter’s workshop. A round clock hangs above the bench, and the carpenter watches from the doorway.
Fable 2The Broom That AskedThe gardener holds the copper Garden-Grown Bird on her palm beneath a pear tree. Its glass throat glows, and a pale repaired tail feather extends behind it.Fable 3The Garden-Grown Bird
A girl kneels to wipe the lit window of a broad, humped blue machine that carries a wicker basket. Her grandmother watches from the shed doorway; matching picking-machines stand in the orchard beyond.
Fable 4The Spare in the Shed
Ash stands at the closed blue gate, holding a hammer and raising her other hand towards the glowing lantern on the gatepost. Two closed albums rest on a small shelf below it.
Fable 5The Gate That Remembered Yesterday