LXI

Tonight I get down from my horse, before the door of the house, where I said farewell with the cock's crowing. It is shut and no one responds. The stone bench on which mama gave birth to my older brother, so he could saddle backs I had ridden bare, through lanes, past hedges, a village boy; the bench on which I left my heartsick childhood yellowing in the sun ... And this mourning that frames the portal? God in alien peace, the beast sneezes, as if calling too; noses about, prodding the cobbles. Then doubts, whinnies, his ears all ears. Papa must be up praying, and perhaps he will think I am late. My sisters, humming their simple, bubblish illusions, preparing for the approaching holy day, and now it's almost here. I wait, I wait, my heart an egg at its moment, that gets blocked. Large family that we left not long ago, no one awake now, and not even a candle placed on the altar so that we might return. I call again, and nothing. We fall silent and begin to sob, and the animal whinnies, keeps on whinnying. They're all sleeping forever, and so nicely, that at last my horse dead-tired starts nodding in his turn, and half-asleep, with each pardon, says it's all right, everything is quite all right.