As I walk the boundaries between the City and the East End Estates, the
boundaries between rich and poor, between logic and strife, my mind walks the
boundary between reason and madness, between reality and illusion, between
logic and psychosis.
I’m walking down the street and there are many people, but I only see
the old. Looking at them makes me cry, I know they suffer and they will die
soon. I have seen that. I saw my father growing old and wilting to almost a
skeleton within five months, and now he’s gone.
I see some children – not many, this is the City and this is not a part
of town where children come. Their faces
also seem worried and sad.
I cannot sleep at night. In the dark I am restless, I want to go out on
the street and run. I call a friend and wake her up. She suggests perhaps to listen
to some music. I cannot bear music – it only reminds me of things that are
utterly sad. This sadness is so painful, I begin to understand why the saints
and monks would auto-flagellate. Physical pain is more bearable than this. At
least if I hurt myself I could scream and cry out my pain. Like this, I can’t. I don’t know what to do
to bring out this pain. I wish to scream at the top of my voice until I run out
of voice. The neighbours. I can’t.
I am starting to think that death is better than this pain. But I want
to have children, I can’t look for death.
I will have to go through this burning pain of fear and torture. I cannot fully describe it. I am afraid of everything, of all the things
I used to like, of each of them in turn, one at a time.
I struggle through days of fear and nights of sleepless torture. My mind
just cannot stop, I wish for sleep and I fear nightmares. Wakefulness feels
like a nightmare. Sleep doesn’t come, and if it does, I chase it away with
fears of sleeping. Everything that is
good and beautiful reminds me of some dead end, of darkness. Happiness and calm are impossible. This sadness is so heavy I cannot even cry.
I finally arrive home, after enduring some painful days among people to
get to this place. I cannot bear to see
people. I made it all the way to the countryside, against all fear and
darkness, because this is the place where I will put this burden down: the
grass under the walnut tree. I have been
looking through all my memories of life, and this is the only one left that
gives me hope: the one piece of grass,
under the one walnut tree, in the country-side garden of my childhood.
After a week of waiting for this, I sit down on the grass, under the walnut
tree. This is the place where I have
been longing to be. I have dragged
myself all this way, all along that long and frightening journey, to sit down
here, on the grass under the walnut tree, and to feel the pain and darkness drain
out of me into the ground, slithering into the dark soil where it belongs. In the dark nights of painful wakefulness, I let
the red hot irons of fear drag through my heart, my mind and soul, knowing that
I will bury them into the black soothing soil, under the grass, under the
walnut tree.
I want to feel alone, like I do in Hyde Park under the trees, but still,
even here, there are people. The children play to one side of the garden,
ignoring me, a woman is cooking. Another is sitting on the porch painting her
nails and reading a garish fashion magazine.
For one long moment, my feet are glad to touch that ground. Then I worry: I am wearing rubber soles, it
may not be enough. I need to be
barefoot. I am about to take my shoes off and feel the total relief of being
one with the ground, dust to dust, letting my pain go to dust, when a woman
suddenly calls out to me:
“Don’t just sit there, people
will see you from the road! It’s right
in front of the gate...”
I feel robbed.
I go inside the house and sit on the bed. My forehead sinks into my palms and my heart
sinks deeper than it has even been in black nothingness. I know life is worth
living and it’s the most beautiful thing, but I have forgotten why. I descend spiralling into thick
darkness. I cannot remember any reason
why it’s worth it.
Somebody feels my silent pain from
the other room, because I hear a little whimper and steps approaching. The
little girl is one year old and can barely walk, holding on to walls. She
cannot speak yet, but somehow I know she felt my call for help.
Her hazel eyes have long lashes
like little sea-stars. She comes into my
room thumping on the floor. She gives me a preoccupied look and hands me a
bunny rabbit cuddly toy. I take it and
hold it tight to my chest, closing my eyes.
After a while I breathe out, relieved, I open my eyes and give her a
tortured smile. She looks at me
serenely, with the satisfaction of a home-maker who has just taken a nice cake
out of the oven.
She walks out of the room and comes
back with a tube of mascara in her pudgy hand. She gives it to me.
Now I’m really smiling. A miracle
has just happened.
That night, I sleep holding the
bunny tight against my chest.
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