SONG 11
My Wheel of Fortune,
My summit, accelerating my descent,
My abyss, thrusting itself toward the mountain tops,
My eternal effort in the dunes,
Always within hand’s reach
And yet so uncertain,
My unforeseen foreseeable,
A bit outdated, déjà vu,
And yet like the certainty of a morning
And the surprise of its innumerable incidents,
Like a gift from heaven despite the violence of accidents,
The same certainty each morning since that furtive evening
When my destiny was in your hands,
You whose name will stick to my skin,
You who will push me toward the huge leap
And affect even my self-perception—
How, in that intense uncertainty, could I foresee meeting you?
• • •
My first outing in the city by night, filled with light: traffic lights, thousands of headlights, streetlights, signs in a thousand colors; even people’s eyes seem to have taken fire, to be transformed into lights, lights of craving and desire, of lust.
For once I pray that we can actually go to the broadcast, and that I won’t have to be limited to postcards. Alas, I have no choice but to settle for the rebroadcast in that sightless room.
This evening Deborah is particularly excited. Her boyfriend has ventured very close, too close perhaps, to our house, and we have to pretend not to know or even notice him. He’s holding a large radio, which is playing a popular rumba. He passes us, slows down, lets us pass him, and then it starts all over again. We arrive at his place first, but hesitate to go in. Finally, my friend charges into the cottage and goes straight to the bedroom. Our host gives me a radiant smile and rushes in after her, dancing the twist.
Frankly, I have no earthly desire to go in as well just to hear their chortling again. I’d really like to walk around a bit. But a group of carefree boys passes by very closely and begins to whistle at me, one of them going so far as to touch my behind. I resign myself to going in and literally collapse on the usual chair.
I don’t know how long I’ve been horizontal before I realize I’m not alone. My heart nearly stops when I discover a boy right beside me, looking at me almost nose to nose, for he must have been quite intrigued to see me so upset all by myself.
Astonished at my fear, the boy recoils all the way to a corner of the wall and raises his arms as if threatened by a gun. I start laughing nervously and then burst into tears. Even more surprised, he comes back to me.
“Please—I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to scare or hurt you. I . . . I would so much like to help you or console you. What’s wrong? Who did this to you?”
“Did what?”
“Well . . . whatever it is that has put you in this state. Who’s making you cry like this?”
“Isn’t it you?”
I cry all the more, irresistibly, and don’t know why. The young man kneels in front of me and takes my hands in his.
“Calm down, I beg you. I’m here now, and you’re not alone anymore.”
“Really? You’re here now. And where will you be later when they’re busy marrying me off to my grandfather?”
“Well . . . I don’t know.”
“You don’t know, do you? So leave me alone! I bet you don’t know what’s going on in the next room, either. You don’t even have ears to hear.”
“Yes I do, generally I hear quite well! But I’m at the seminary. I’m going to be a priest, you know.”
“Great! So all you need to do is pray.”
“I’m doing just that so you’ll stop being unhappy. But apparently I’m not doing a very good job.”
“Well, for God’s sake try something else then. Time is running out. I don’t want to be handed over to that old vulture unscathed. Do what they’re doing in there.”
Overcome by I don’t know what madness, I grab the young man and pull him on top of me. His weight turns the chair over, and we are on the floor. I feel as if I have eight hands and I don’t know if they are mine or his. We carry on like furies, and I feel something like a rip, which makes me scream.
I beg him to stop, but he’s in a wild frenzy.
He must be having some sort of sudden epileptic fit.
I’m shaking with an indefinable sensation, between pain and pleasure, and am crying all the more.
All of a sudden the boy begins to yell, yell so hard that our friends in the next room emerge thunderstruck as he lets out a final gasp and collapses in a heap beside me. My skirt is covered in blood.
The boy has a haggard look, as if he were having a nightmare.
Frozen in place, our friends stare at us.
I get up, intending to ask them for an explanation, but I collapse, suddenly dizzy.
“I . . . I don’t know what came over me,” the boy stutters. “Eh . . . it’s the first time and . . . I didn’t know . . . well, that she was a virgin. I am so sorry, really very sorry! I . . .”
“Couldn’t you at least have been a bit more gentle and less noisy?” my friend protests. “The neighbors must have heard your mooing. And look at her bloodstained skirt, what are we going to do now?”
“I . . . I’ll wash it if you want me to . . .”
“Stupid bastard! He’s a real find, this one! Where do you dig up those friends of yours?” Deborah says.
“This is my seminarian friend. I’ve told you about him many times. He’s not bad. It must have been a spontaneous thing for them. Let’s calm down. You go and help her undress in the other room. I’ll wash her clothes and iron them right away while you help her put herself together again. That way you can both go home looking good. You, my friend, follow me if you can still stand up, you deflowered little priest!” He bursts out laughing.
While my friends are busy washing my clothes I doze off, shivering under the sheets. I’m dreaming that a snake bites me in my lower belly. Grand Pa Helly catches him by the tail and tries unsuccessfully to pull him off, but he hangs on by his fangs, blowing a kind of hot air into me that makes my belly swell up so big that I’m going to explode. I’m suffocating and fight back. Grand Pa Helly tries to calm me down.
“Gently now, my little wife. Venom, you know, isn’t always what we think it is. But when it truly is venom, then we do not reason with it. Then it’s better to enter into the substance and give it form in the hope of surviving and enjoying it as well!”
I don’t understand a word of this speech, and my belly continues to swell as the snake keeps blowing. I can’t take it anymore. I’m tearing myself away from the impending explosion and wake up. My friend puts my warm and steaming clothes on my belly and looks at me with a mocking smile.
“Well, how about you! You should have told me a long time ago that you wanted it, too. My friend has better-looking buddies than this boor you took on at the last minute. If I’d known, you would have had a better time. . . .”
My throat is constricted, and no sound comes out. The boy is waiting for me in the living room, deeply embarrassed. I throw him a stealthy look and leave without a word. I won’t see him again for another five years.
My unforeseeable foreseeable. An outdated déjà vu.