Paula Ruggeri' storie
Traslater by Claudia De Bella
I
The old poet was already
dying. The doctor had gone away. There was nothing else to do. In the room,
darkened by thick curtains the colour of rage, lighted only by a candle with
the glow of death, the poet was lying down. His forehead was turning pale; his
hands were already the same colour as the candlelight. His daughter was there.
She was fourteen, with a pink complexion and a pain it was useless to show. His
son was there. He was almost twenty and the pain in him was wrath-coloured. A
blush in his skin, his hair red. His mood, the one of someone waiting for the
minute of his liberation. Death was in the room. She was the only one who
expressed absolutely nothing, except herself.
“Clarisa.
Go get my notebook with the red covers and bring it to me.”
The
teenager stood up to do what she was required.
“Son.”
The old man tried to speak loud and clear. “I’m sorry to tell you that you must
keep the coffin in the house after I die.”
“When
you die, Dad, which will happen soon, your dead little friend’s rotten coffin
will fly out of the window. Smashed
into pieces.”
“I’ve
written my will, son. If you don’t keep the coffin, you can’t keep the house.
Girl, Clarisa,” he said more softly, “you must read this notebook,” he took the
red-covered notebook in his white, feeble hands, “and keep it inside the
coffin. You mustn’t sleep in there without reading it first. And you only have
time to do it until you turn fifteen. The
notebook must be kept with the coffin. I entrust this to you. Sweet
Clarisa.”
The
girl could hardly speak. Her eyes met his father’s—that old, sad, crazy poet.
They understood each other. They’d always understood each other.
“She’s
not crazy like you,” the son cried. “And I want to see that will.” Hitting the
wall angrily, he left the room.
Clarisa
couldn’t stop the tears.
What
will I do without you, father? That’s what her fragile hand said to the old
man’s feeble hand.
The
old man understood and smiled.
“Yes, Clarisa. You are crazy like
me. And you’ve been asking yourself the same question
since you were born.”
What’s
their sanity worth
Compared
to my heavenly madness?
His
voice quivered when he uttered the lines of his most acclaimed poem.
“Don’t
let them beat you. If you have to isolate yourself, do it. Take good care of
the notebook. I’m leaving it to you. If you have children, tell them the secret
at your dying time. Never pretend the secret doesn’t exist.”
“I
won’t.”
“Blow the candle off. We’re
in the dark, little darling. In the dark, light can lie down with the one who’s
lying. And whisper
the secret to him.”
“Father.” Her
sobs felt more irrepressible, more insistent, only because everything was
black, everything was dark.
Her
crying muffled the old man’s last words.
“You’ll be a poet. You’ll be
great. Greater than me.”
He had a confusing, restless
dream. Clarisa appeared in the dream, dressed in white,
whispering verses. Clarisa was lying still, the motionless lover. He slept that
dream and died.
Raúl von Kotsch
1-15-1846 12-9-1926
His
son John and his daughter Clarisa pray for his soul.
II
“You’re crazy, just like your mother,” Pablo
mumbled with satisfaction. “Your
mom was crazy. She used to sleep in a coffin, my father says.”
“My mom wasn’t crazy. You´re
an idiot, just like your father,” Clara said disdainfully, her complexion pink,
her look hard. Life with her uncle had hardened her. When her mother was alive
it was different. The house belonged just to both of them. They were happy. Her
mom used to write poems, but had never published them. Clara thought her
mother’s poems were great. She’d died two years ago. Clara hadn’t seen her
uncle Juan in her whole life before that. He’d hardly visited her mother when
she was ill. Now, he and his stupid son, Pablo, owned the old house and her
life. They’d removed all the furniture, the pictures, the books. They’d sold everything. What
they couldn’t sell, they threw away. But they couldn’t get rid of what they
hated the most. The coffin. It was one of the valuable objects in the house.
Just because her mother worshipped it. It used to be in the red room. She
called it like that because of the heavy crimson curtains. Now, both the
curtains and the coffin were in the attic. Now, there was a billiard table in
the former red room. Uncle Juan used to gather there with his friends. They
laughed and drank until dawn, on Saturdays. On weekdays, her uncle went to the
Sock Market and Clara stayed at home, alone with her cousin.
“At
least I had a mother,” Clara said quietly, almost sweetly.
Pablo turned red. He raised his
fist. And Clara started to run.
Up
the stairs, down the stairs. Clara
spent her days running from her cousin’s fists. Luckily,
in summer afternoons he left with his blockheaded friends. And when he left,
Clara was alone with her memories and her attic.
Everything
that belonged to her was in the attic. The red curtains, her mother and
grandfather’s notebooks. Raúl von Kotsch had been famous in his time. That’s
why his son, no matter how much he hated to remember him, could never make the
decision of getting rid of his manuscripts. They weren’t listed at the Stock
Market, that was for sure. But it was worth waiting, in case they had any value
some day.
Now
Pablo was gone. He’d suddenly remembered they were waiting for him at some wild
party and stopped beating her. When the door closed, Clara used her dress to
wipe the tears and the blood in her face and, still crying, went to the
attic.
The
stairway was steep and the ceiling too low. The door wasn’t locked. In any
case, she was the only one who ever got in there. No one but her found any
value in the things inside. She sat down on the old curtains, her hands on her
knees, and cried for a long time.
“Poetry
comforts you,” her mother used to say. “If you are alone and feel like crying,
a poem is a better consolation than anything else.”
Her
mother knew a lot. Clara picked out an old notebook among the many around. It
was impossible to read them all. Sometimes she opened a notebook and it was her
mother’s. Sometimes it was her grandfather’s. And sometimes it was some hideous
accounting book of Uncle Juan’s. So Clara went downstairs, tore it to pieces
and threw it away.
This
one looked liked it belonged to her grandfather. But, strangely, it was prose.
She was curious, despite her tears. When she read the beginning, she forgot her
sorrow. It had been written to her.
I’m Raúl von Kotsch and I’m writing this to my
daughter Clarisa and my descendants. This is the answer to the question you may
have asked yourselves. Why do we have to keep the
coffin?
The ink had faded. Clara
needed glasses, but her uncle spent as little as possible on her. Just food,
and a dress when he had no choice.
First I’ll tell you the story of the Motionless Lover.
The coffin belongs to her. Her name was Amalia Beatriz Saenz Zumarán. She was a poet.
The night
of her presentation in society, when she was fifteen, the whole brilliant local
high-society was there. In the middle of the party, she fainted. When they
loosened up her clothes, they found she was dead. She had a stain on her hand,
which made the doctors decide to bury her at once. The memories of the plague
were still fresh. She was put in the coffin, the coffin was nailed, and she was
buried the next morning with no ceremony. Just her parents.
Not even a priest. The
vault was sealed. It was one of the biggest in the graveyard at that time; it
had a small anteroom and a barred door.
But
she wasn’t dead. She had catalepsy. She woke up inside the coffin. Terrified, she managed
to open it with her fingernails and her blows. She was able to get out. She
could make it to the vault anteroom. And she died of
horror, embracing the bars, in the dark night.
Clara
sighed. Her nose kept bleeding, but she’d forgotten about it. She imagined
Amalia, the motionless lover. The dark night.
The coffin ended up in our family’s hands, it hardly
matters how. My father bought it, together with the weird story it contained.
Necrophilia, Clarisa, is an important business for graveyard keepers. For
Amelia’s family, the coffin was a horrid reminder. For the man who sold it, it
was just money. For my father, as well as for me, it was a sacred relic.
To you, Clarisa, I leave the coffin and its secret.
Its blessing doesn’t belong to me; its curse is not mine. They are the
Motionless Lover’s possessions.
You’ll
know everything
If
you sleep inside me,
Death,
Life, White, Black.
But
when your spring day
Has
passed
You’ll
know, sleeping in me,
The
same we, the dead,
Know
about death.
Never get into the coffin after you turn fifteen. The
Motionless Lover never forgives those who live longer than her. But if you’re
not fifteen yet, spend a night, just one night, inside it. And
you’ll be a poet. You’ll be great. And you’ll tell Life from Death.
Clara closed the notebook. She
was excited. There were still twenty days to go before her fifteenth birthday. The time was right. She stood up.
She went near the coffin. She took a deep breath. She opened it and lied down
inside.
Close
it.
The
voice was in her head. She
obeyed.
She fell asleep. First
she saw her mother in the red room, writing like she used to when Clara was a
child.
A
man was looking at her. Blonde,
high cheekbones. He smiled with tenderness. Suddenly, he raised his head. He
looked at her, at Clara. He put his hands on his mouth, and then stretched them
out to her—his kiss flew like a swirling breeze. White. Everything was white. The breeze surrounded
her, seconds of heat and frost. She got dizzy.
Clara.
Sweet girl.
It
was a woman’s voice. She saw a young girl like her, strange, dressed in
white.
Death turns everything strange.
Black hair, her skin as white as paper or as…
Yes, Clara. Death
is white. And life is sometimes black. Come closer.
Clara did. The Motionless Lover smiled.
I’ve been waiting for you. The spring of your life will come and you won’t
return. But I’ll do something for you. Something you already know about… and
something else.
She stretched her white hand and shook her fingers.
Magic, Clara. I’ll give you
magic. Close your eyes. This
poem will be yours.
And
Clara thought in rhymes, for the first time in her short life. The lines were clear in her head.
It was the Motionless Lover’s voice.
The
unknown one will come,
The most mysterious.
She’ll come as she is
Tall, sad and painful.
She’ll come from the South
And she’ll be
like the river
When
she dies.
Clara’s
voice joined to the Motionless Lover’s.
She’ll come with
the music
Unfamiliar
hands
Will
play for me.
And
Clara’s voice went on.
The wounded
happiness.
The
breeze embraced her, softer, warmer. Now she was alone, writing in the red
room.
She’ll
be my long-lost love,
She’ll
be my unholy illusion.
Heaven’s
blood
Will
fall on my head
For
I wrote her wounds.
Now
the Lover was facing her. She was smiling and crying at the same time.
I’ve given it to you, Clara. I’ve given you the
secret, as I did to your grandfather and mother. Thank
you, Clara. Thank you. I’ve cried through long nights with no days. Long days
with no nights. My treasure, the one I never passed on. My secret is yours.
You’ll be a poet. You’ll be great. Greater than me.
She’s tall and painful.
She comes from
the South.
Clara
felt a sudden pain. A
deadly pain. She was pulled away from life. She was pulled away from the
Motionless Lover’s arms.
Light
hurt her. She was shaken with violence.
“Crazy
like your mother,” she heard.
“Let
me go,” Clara cried.
“No.”
“Let
me go, Pablo.”
“Get
out of there.”
Clara
got out, crying.
“I
knew you were doing that.”
“What
I do is none of your business.”
“Is
it comfortable?” he mocked.
“Don’t laugh at me.”
“You’re
dead,” Pablo mocked again.
“No.”
“Yes. Booooooh.”
Clara hid her face.
“Crazy like your mother.”
Clara
shivered with hate. Finally, she said slowly:
“You are scared.”
“Me?”
he said in surprise.
“Yes.
You don’t dare get inside.”
“Oh, yeah?” He turned red. “I
don’t do it because I’m not crazy like you and your mother.”
“You
don’t do it because you’re scared,” Clara said. She was still crying, but her
voice sounded as mocking as his. Pablo
turned red and shot out his fist. She ducked and laughed. She
laughed at him.
“You
don’t dare”.
“I
do, you’ll see. I’m going in, and when I get out I’ll beat you to death.”
“He,
Pablo, the greatest. He, the strongest, because he’s a man and sixteen years
old. The idiot.”
“Bah.
Crazy like your mother.”
Pablo
put one leg into the coffin, then the other. He sat down. He insulted her some
more and lied down.
And
the coffin slammed close.
Clara
whispered something. She ran downstairs and shut herself in the billiard room.
The former red room.
After
his son’s horrible death, after burying him, Juan von Kotsch locked himself in
his bedroom, loaded his gun and shot himself.
III
Buenos Aires, October 24th, 1970
“I,
Clara von Kotsch, mentally able, with no descendants or close relatives, leave
my house and everything it contains to the Poet Society of the Americas, to be
turned into its headquarters or for the purposes their members choose,
including the property’s sale. I leave them everything it contains, except for
the coffin in the attic. I hereby state my will that it must be destroyed after
my death, so I’ve made special arrangements to have it done. The Poet Society
of the Americas can dispose freely of everything else. I consider this Society
my descendant.”
She is tall and painful.
She comes from the South.
Her feet are tired
And her gaze is sweet.
She is Heaven’s blood,
She is Hell’s crying.
Both of them are her.
She is the Motionless Lover
In the only starless night.
