The Plague Colemn

To the four corners of the earth they turn: the four demobilized knights of the heavenly host. And the four corners of the earth are barred behind four heavy locks. Down the sunny path the ancient shadow of the column staggers from the hour of Shackles to the hour of Dance. From the hour of the Rose to the hour of the Dragon’s Claw. From the hour of Smiles to the hour of Wrath. From the hour of Hope to the hour of Never, whence it is just a short step to the hour of Despair, to Death’s turnstile. Our lives run like fingers over sandpaper, days, weeks, years, centuries. And there were times when we spent long years in tears. I still walk around the column where so often I waited, listening to the water gurgling from apocalyptic mouths, always astonished at the water’s flirtatiousness as it splintered on the basin’s surface until the Column’s shadow fell across your face. That was the hour of the Rose. You there, young lad, do me a favour: climb up on the fountain and read out to me the words the four Evangelists are writing on their stone pages. The Evangelist Matthew is first. And which of us from pure joy can add to his life’s span one cubit? And what does Mark, the second, write? Is a candle bought to be put under a bushel and not to be set on a candlestick? And the Evangelist Luke? The light of the body is in the eye. But where many bodies are thither will many eagles be gathered together. And lastly, John, the favourite of the Lord, what does he write? He has his book shut on his lap. Then open it, boy. If needs be with your teeth. I was christened on the edge of Olsany in the plague chapel of Saint Roch. When bubonic plague was raging in Prague they laid the dead around the chapel. Body upon body, in layers. Their bones, over the years, grew into rough-stacked pyres which blazed in the quicklime whirlwind of clay. For a long time I would visit these mournful places, but I did not forsake the sweetness of life. I felt happy in the warmth of human breath and when I roamed among people I tried to catch the perfume of women’s hair. On the steps of the Olsany taverns I used to crouch at night to hear the coffin-bearers and grave-diggers singing their rowdy songs. But that was long ago the taverns have fallen silent, the grave-diggers in the end buried each other. When spring came within reach, with feather and lute, I’d walk around the lawn with the Japanese cherries on the south side of the chapel and, bewitched by their aging splendour, think about girls silently undressing at night. I did not know their names but one of them, when sleep would not come, tapped softly on my window. And who was it that wrote those poems on my pillow? Sometimes I would stand by the wooden bell tower. The bell was tolled whenever they lifted up a corpse in the chapel. It too is silent now. I gazed on the neo-classical statuary in the Mal Strana cemetery. The statues were still grieving over their dead from whom they’d had to part. Leaving, they walked slowly with the smile of their ancient beauty. And there were among them not only women but also soldiers with helmets, and armed unless I’m mistaken. I haven’t been here for a long time. Don’t let them dupe you that the plague’s at an end: I’ve seen too many coffins hauled through this dark gateway, which is not the only one. The plague still rages and it seems that the doctors are giving different names to the disease to avoid a panic. Yet it is still the same old death and nothing else, and it is so contagious no one alive can escape it. Whenever I have looked out of my window, emaciated horses have been drawing that ill-boding cart with a gaunt coffin. Only, those bells aren’t tolled so often now, crosses no longer painted on front doors, juniper twigs no longer burnt for fumigation. In the Julian Fields we’d sometimes lie at nightfall, as Brno was sinking into the darkness, and in the branches of the Svitava the frogs began their plaint. Once a young gipsy sat down beside us. Her blouse was half unbuttoned and she read our hands. To Halas she said: You won’t live to be fifty. To Artus Chernfk: You’ll live till just after that. I didn’t want her to tell my fortune, I was afraid. She seized my hand and angrily exclaimed: You’ll live a long time! It sounded like a threat. The many rondels and songs I wrote! There was a war all over the world and all over the world was grief. And yet I whispered into jewelled ears verses of love. It makes me feel ashamed. But no, not really. A wreath of sonnets I laid upon the curves of your lap as you fell asleep. It was more beautiful than the laurel wreaths of speedway winners. But suddenly we met at the steps of the fountain, we each went somewhere else, at another time and by another path. For a long time I felt I kept seeing your legs, sometimes I even heard your laughter but it wasn’t you. And finally I even saw your eyes. But only once. My skin thrice dabbed with a swab soaked in iodine was golden brown, the colour of the skin of dancing girls in Indian temples. I stared fixedly at the ceiling to see them better and the flower-decked procession moved round the temple. One of them, the one in the middle with the blackest eyes, smiled at me. God, what foolishness is racing through my head as I lie on the operating table with drugs in my blood. And now they’ve lit the lamp above me, the surgeon brings his scalpel down and firmly makes a long incision. Because I came round quickly I firmly closed my eyes again. Even so I caught a glimpse of female eyes above a sterile mask just long enough for me to smile. Hallo, beautiful eyes. By now they had ligatures around my blood vessels and hooks opening up my wounds to let the surgeon separate the paravertebral muscles and expose the spines and arches. I uttered a soft moan. I was lying on my side, my hands tied at the wrists but with my palms free: these a nurse was holding in her lap up by my head. I firmly gripped her thigh and fiercely pressed it to me as a diver clutches a slim amphora streaking up to the surface. Just then the pentothol began to flow into my veins and all went black before me. There was a darkness as at the end of the world and I remember no more. Dear nurse, you got a few bruises. I’m very sorry. But in my mind I say: A pity I couldn’t bring this alluring booty up with me from the darkness into the light and before my eyes. The worst is over now, I tell myself: I’m old. The worst is yet to come: I’m still alive. If you really must know: I have been happy. Sometimes a whole day, sometimes whole hours, sometimes just a few minutes. All my life I have been faithful to love. And if a woman’s hands are more than wings what then are her legs? How I enjoyed testing their strength. That soft strength in their grip. Let those knees then crush my head! If I closed my eyes in this embrace I would not be so drunk and there wouldn’t be that feverish drumming in my temples. But why should I close them? With open eyes I have walked through this land. It’s beautiful -- but you know that. It has meant more to me perhaps than all my loves, and her embrace has lasted all my life. When I was hungry I fed almost daily on the words of her songs. Those who have left hastily fled to distant lands, must realize it by now: the world is terrible. They do not love and are not loved. We at least love. So let her knees then crush my head! Here is an accurate catalogue of guided missiles. Surface-to-air Surface-to-surface Surface-to-sea Air-to-air Air-to-surface Air-to-sea Sea-to-air Sea-to-sea Sea-to-surface Hush, city, I can’t make out the whispering of the weir. And people go about, quite unsuspecting that above their heads fly fiery kisses delivered by hand from window to window. Mouth-to-eye Mouth-to-face Mouth-to-mouth And so on Until a hand at night pulls down a blind and hides the target. On the narrow horizon of home between sewing box and slippers with swansdown pompoms her belly’s hot moon is quickly waxing. Already she counts the days of the lark though the sparrows are still pecking poppyseed behind frost-etched flowers. In the wild-thyme nest someone’s already winding up the spring of the tiny heart so it should go accurately all life long. What’s all this talk of grey hair and wisdom? When the bush of life burns down experience is worthless. Indeed it always is. After the hailstorm of graves the column was thrust up high and four old poets leaned back on it to write on the books pages their bestsellers. The basin now is empty, littered with cigarette stubs, and the sun only hesitantly uncovers the grief of the stones pushed aside. A place perhaps for begging. But to cast my life away just like that for nothing at all -- that I won’t do.