Bridge of Beyond by Simone Schwarz-Bart

Author:Simone Schwarz-Bart
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: New York Review Books
Published: 2013-06-26T22:00:00+00:00

8

IN THE PERFECTION of my rise, its speed and resonance, there was something disturbing, and I was puzzled at having obtained, all at the same time, the three crowns that can usually be hoped for only at the end of a long life. Love, the trust of others, and that kind of glory that accompanies every woman who is happy—these were gifts too great not to become dangerous in God’s sight. So sometimes, in the shade of my Chinese plum, I would tremble with fright, trying to make out the exact moment when the Almighty would take umbrage at my crowns. But then a little breeze would come and play with my skirt, my sleeves, my braids, and I’d feel I could go on like that until the end of time, and it was as if I was already embalmed, powdered, and laid out happy on my deathbed.

Since the evening when Queen Without a Name had come with me to the cabin and roasted a few cobs of corn to sanction my presence under Elie’s roof, I seemed to have entered another world; it was as if I never lived before, never known how to. When Elie looked at me, then, only then, I existed, and I knew well that if ever one day he turned away from me I should disappear again into the void. I watched him as a sailor watches the wind in fair weather, knowing not every ship reaches haven. The feeling I bore him overflowed onto every creature my eye lighted on, and I marveled at the skill and agility with which man fulfills his destiny, however changeable, unpredictable, or excessive it may be. Life went on turning, suns and moons were engulfed and then reborn in the sky, and my continuing joy lifted me out of time. But meanwhile there were the dead children, the old who survived them, and friendship betrayed, razor slashes, the wicked waxing strong on their wickedness, and women with garments woven of desertion and want, and so on. And sometimes a long thorn slowly pierced my heart, and I’d wish I were like the tree called Resolute, on which it is said the whole globe and all its calamities could lean.

One evening when I was taking my usual stroll in front of my cabin, a neighbor stared at me so persistently that I asked her: “Are you so fond of me, mother, that you wear out your eyes on me like this?” And the woman answered at once, as if she expected my question and had prepared for it: “Everyone loves dragonflies, and you are a dragonfly without even knowing it. You know how to light up your own soul, and that is why you shine for everyone else.”

“If you think I’m a dragonfly, mother, perhaps I’ll really become one.”

Then I went on with my stroll, thinking that if it was so obvious, the time must be near when every second would seem to me like a whole year.

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