The rock garden epub by Nikos Kazantzakis

Author:Nikos Kazantzakis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 1963-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

23

A little sitting room overlooking the garden.

The windows are open, the sun already shining into the courtyard. Two canaries begin singing as the light touches their gilded cage. The old gardener comes and goes, lingering over each bush. Tenderly he straightens it, removes a tiny dry branch; he caresses it. His eye is sure and full of love.

Siu-lan, Li-Te and I sip our aromatic tea in delicate old cups. At the bottom of the cup appears a menacing yellow dragon.

Old paintings on silk glow where they hang on the wall. I cannot make them out clearly in the blue morning shadows, but at the rear in a niche I joyfully recognize a statuette of Kwannon, goddess of mercy.

Siu-lan poured me more tea. Then she sat down and leaned toward me.

I started—how much Siu-lan resembled Kwannon! Her oval face, her slanting eyes, her sensual lips, her brows brandished like sharp swords—the same austerity mingled with gentleness, the same aristocratic and welcoming expression.

“Kwannon … Kwannon,” I murmured, shuddering.

My heart could never have created such a goddess of mercy—sure, disdainful, motionless. She does not cure pain by acting; she does not bring the miserable consolation. This Kwannon is a goddess who cures the human heart, sitting motionless on her throne. Merely seeing her is enough to make you forget all pain.

She tilted her head slightly, as if her large Buddha-like ears were listening to human suffering from some great distance, and Buddha’s daughter smiles for she knows that suffering too is an illusion, like happiness—that you will awaken and that suffering will vanish like a dream. You will vanish too, and the Universe, and the Cause of the Universe.

I looked at Kwannon and I felt my heart overflowing in reply. I was happy. Time, in my breast, had stopped.

“She’s Japanese,” I said mechanically, indicating the lovely statuette.

“No,” Siu-lan said, timid yet firm. “No, she’s Chinese.”

Li-Te was sitting opposite me, his face calm and inscrutable; I sensed his eyes fixed on me without tenderness.

Silence. The air was heavy, filled with unspoken questions. In the space between Li-Te and me I felt a new and invisible struggle.

Siu-lan was sitting between us. She wore a blue gown with wide embroidered sleeves and silver buttons. Her father, she told us, regretted that he could not join us for tea; he had had a bad dream and was feeling sorrowful.

Suddenly Li-Te raised his voice, while Siu-lan looked up at her brother with a pleading expression.

“What new sensation are you seeking in China? For I know you, old friend. You’re a pirate, and you rove the seas like a true white man.”

I said nothing. How could I make this determined and practical yellow man understand the vague, profound anxieties of my being? I sensed his attachment to a positive goal; he was surely one of the leaders of the Kuomintang. He had a specific purpose: to liberate his country from the White Men or the Yellow; to waken his people; to make them worthy of freedom and justice. Every day he took a step toward this goal.

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