The Wardian Case
I’m fascinated by many things, things that have fascinated many before me and those who will one day have similar if not an the exact thought process as my own.
Creation, its dawning…
I am not arrogant enough to believe it is only I who can see beauty in devastation, but I am arrogant enough to believe only I can feel that fascination in my unique way. What you believe is of no matter to me… but of great importance to you.
I’m fascinated by the rising of the sun, as it dances across the backdrop of its ever changing canvas, the clouds sprinting from its presence as it climbs taking its place above the revolving stage we call home, no two skies ever look the same.
The sun as it’s setting — mating with the horizon, as its blazing lips scorch the edge of the sea. Two opposing elements, but elemental only to their own philosophy. I’m aware they never touch but the illusion fascinates me, as the sun is embraced by the aphotic blanket of the nighted sea, once again till morning.
Today it seemed to be tilted.
The winds, the flowers, the trees, the vernal sprouts that break from the earth, in prayer they rise, praising the sun as they turn to receive communion from its warmth.
The cool glass of water, it is smooth but why did the condensation carve the path it did?, it could have taken another route.
The ants back and forth in travel, memorizing highway’s and byway’s, back to back traffic, at the rhythmic pace of survival. Bumper cars they reverse just before impact with overloaded oncoming traffic.
Oh, and the fly, that annoying fly that lands curiously on the circular rim of my glass — just before it falls into a liquid grave. Spinning round and about as I hear his frenzied buzzing, overexerting itself in its effort to fly free. Its buzzing sporadic, as it finally floats on the current it had itself created. I’m fascinated as to why I didn’t save it — I was told it was annoying.
Today, a couple of hours before dawn, I don’t remember the exact time, I received a visitor. I knew immediately something was amiss, I’ve learned to read people, I’ve had to, by the way they carry the burden of their souls. How they dress it, defines their character.
He walked the last steps up my veranda, his shoulders hunched, gazing at the ground, his hat in held his hands as his fingers fidgeted with the coarse fabric, as though trying to read some indecipherable text in Linear A, the etiquette of presentation.
He greeted me, I could not respond. I held my breath, suffocating — bad news always seems to visit in those hours before morning, as traveling companions that part ways. I nod to him to continue, to explain his unexpected visit.
He did, he rushed through his unfashionable explanation as though by saying it quickly he’d be able to take his leave, planting the responsibility on my shoulders, absolving himself from any penance due… As we say, “ May the bad news shade my sisters home, and not my own.”
I released my abated breath on a controlled faint, I felt lightheaded for a moment, before I righted myself, not unlike that fly trapped in its grave. I found my footing, I breathed, exhaling on a trembling moan — no!
I pulled my door shut behind me and head towards the village, doors were being flung open to greet the new day — I don’t know what was running through my mind, I just know my solemn thoughts chased each other in circles, I had a duty, that I didn’t ask for.
I climbed the 277 steps up to the Bounaro, my feet blindly leading me over every nook and cranny. I had played as a child in those nooks and crannies, I knew them well, I put some there, I knew the way and my heart had no choice but to follow, sigh.
I knock —and the door is opened expectantly, Asimi’s aggrandizing smile greeting me — it stilled, as she stares into my eyes, her smile wanes as she denyingly reads what she sees, the deliverer — she grabs on to me for support, she understood.
Her face, I knew so well, every nook every cranny, fascinated me, just as the rising sun — it had set. Contradicting emotions, wandered aimlessly on her face, disbelief, anger but pain came home to roost. She wished me to tell her I was mistaken.
How I wished in that moment of awareness, I could have granted her prayer, tell her it was one of the stories I would tell, a poem, as I did many a day’s before… give her an illusion she could balm her pain upon.
And as the setting sun she embraced me and I held her to my heart, I became for her, her illusionary support, her blanket in her most devastating trial — the sun would rise again, Asimi’s sun in a changed world, a different sky, beneath the shade of loss.
Her smooth face as smooth as glass, aged before my eyes, her tears carved eternal trails through the mosaic path of her dreams, as we watched our villagers approaching, overloaded with sorrow, like the ants that labour together, coming to her aid in a show of solidarity.
The “no” she kept whispering, between her prayers and her lament, paused for breath on the lip’s of acceptance. I know that “no”, ever so well, there isn’t a day that I don’t deny it, but the rooster always crows betraying my peace.
Her vernal sprout, he will never again praise in the warmth of her communion again. Her son is gone, he is with us no more…
I am trapped like a fly in a glassed Wardian case, of sunrises and sunsets, ants and flies, a fascinating condensing illusion, where I am the one chosen to break the devastating seal, a heart, as I float on the current of life’s aggrandizing fascination with itself.
I take my leave, as I walk away, I am fascinated as to how I have no memory of what stores of strength I pull from, as I floated home on the wings of despair, the Bell’s of St. George, rang in sets of three, consecutively peeling — forlornly in mourning.
I halt in my stride, I turn and watch their pendulous cry,
I’m fascinated by the ringing of the bells, yesterday they had rung, announcing a birth… today they feelingly reverberate with the metallic blade of a knife, cutting, a loss , the message— to the four corners of my village.
Each time it rings, a new chapter is written, its title, “Again”…
I’m fascinated, how does the Bell know what we are feeling?
Copyright ©. R Tsambounieri Talarantas. June 3, 2020. All Rights Reserved.