Raduan Nassar: Ancient Tillage

shrivelled holes, and I have no doubt that his light-filled eyes above me were poisoning me, and I was almost overcome by a silent, short wave that nearly made me yell ‘Don’t worry, brother, all you have to do is hurry to find the solemn voice you’re seeking, that voice strengthened by disapproval, rush into questions about what has been going on all along, try out your gestures, disagree with me to my face, shatter the family china before my eyes,’ just to make him angry, but I refrained, believing that to exhort him would not only be useless, but also foolish; instead, I fell to thinking about his eyes, about my mother’s, in the most silent moments of the afternoon, behind which the tenderness and apprehension of an entire family were hidden, and I thought of her opening my bedroom door at odd times and the emerging of her maternal, solicitous shape, ‘Darling, don’t stay in bed like that, don’t make me suffer, speak to me,’ and, surprised and frightened, I felt that any minute my tears would explode, while at the same time, I thought it might be good to take advantage of the last dregs of my drunkenness that had not yet been cowed by his arrival, by confessing piously perhaps, ‘It’s my delirium, Pedro, it’s my delirium, if you want to know the truth,’ but this was no more than a slightly tumultuous thought flashing through my mind, making me finish off my wine in two rapid gulps, I thought it senseless to say anything at all and began hearing my brother’s appropriately calm, serene voice (he was fulfilling the sublime mission of returning the wayward son to the bosom of the family) as he started speaking in prayer mode (it was my father’s tone) of the stones and mortar of our cathedral.

Sudanesa (or Schuda) was generously formed; beneath a sloping, thatched roof of thick, golden, coarse grass, she lived inside a pen built with stakes stuck firmly into the ground, one next to the other, between which I only just dared to glimpse; she gulped and swished water from a clay bowl, freshly filled every morning; she lay down and rested her head on a bed well stacked with sweet-smelling, soft hay, even as the sun outside reached high noon; her trough was always clean, filled with corn kernels and carefully picked green grass into which I rubbed parsley to stimulate her appetite; the first time I saw Sudanesa with my sickly eyes was when I brought her out one evening among the flowering bushes surrounding her courtesan’s rural boudoir: I led her carefully, like a devoted lover, and she followed docilely on her high hooves, playfully, swinging her proud, ample body swaying on the pillars of her finely shaped legs; it was the body I had begun to take care of in the late afternoons, my humus-coated hands plunging into receptacles of soothing ointments with their various aromas, delving right afterwards into her soft, fringed coat; but she was not a lascivious nanny-goat, she was a boy’s nanny-goat, her contours were defined by full, bloated nipples, and with her tremors, her darkest, most private parts were exposed and she was completely susceptible to the comb running through her luxurious, bulging coat; she was a smug nanny-goat, an earring-clad she-goat with a small tail, no more than a healthy, bristle-covered, wire spring, which reacted to the lightest of touches, highly sensitive to the most subtle, gentle caresses of a finger; her entire body sculpted itself while manoeuvring a green stem around in her patient mouth — chewing not with her teeth, but with time; in these moments, she was made of stone, two traces of sorrow engraved in her eyes; in this mystical posture, with her long, black lashes, she was a predestined goat; Sudanesa had been brought to the fazenda to add new blood, though she had arrived expecting, and required special care, that was when I, a timid adolescent, took the first steps outside my solitude: I left my idleness behind and — sacrilege — appointed myself her lyric shepherd; I perfected her shape, made her coat shine and gave her flowered jewels, winding around her neck yards of creeper vine, with its brightly coloured fruit dangling like bells; Schuda was patient, even more, generous, as a swollen, mysterious and lubricious stem sought, through intercourse, the concurrence of her body.

Love, union, and our work alongside our father was the message of austere purity stored safely in our shrines, solemnly absorbed at daily communion, in the making of our morning breakfast and within our evening scripture; without losing sight of the pious clarity of this maxim, my brother proceeded with his sermon, discreetly reminding me, each step of the way, of my immaturity in life, speaking of the mishaps to which everyone is vulnerable, and saying that it was normal that this should have happened, but it was also important to bear in mind the unique emotional and spiritual ties that bound us, which would prevent us from ever succumbing to temptation and which guarded us against a fall (no matter what its nature); at the very least, each family member had to do his part to be responsible for and look after these ties, each family member had to uphold his share, since if only one member were to make a false move, the entire family would topple; he said that as long as the house stood, each one of us also stood, and to keep the house from falling, our sense of obligation must be strengthened constantly, we must worship our blood ties, never wander beyond our doorway, always answer our father when he spoke, never avert our eyes from a brother in need, participate in the work of the family, bring fruit into the home and help to replenish the common table; thus, within the austerity of our way of life there would always be room for a great deal of happiness, beginning with the fulfilment of our individually assigned tasks, since a person would be condemned to bear a terrible burden were he to shirk the sacred demands of his duties; he went on to say that everyone at home had their own desires, but nevertheless, evil impulses must be restrained, all the while those that were good should be moderated prudently, without ever losing sight of the balance, cultivating self-control, protecting oneself from egoism and the dangerous passion by which it is accompanied, seeking solutions to personal problems without creating more serious problems for loved ones, and he reminded me that to think through any given situation the same solid trunk, faithful hand, loving word and wise principles had always been there, and that life’s horizon was not as expansive as some tend to believe; in my case, the happiness I had imagined existed beyond our father’s realm was no more than an illusion; disavowing the irreverent reasons for my flight (although suggesting discreetly my steps had set a bad example for Lula, the youngest in the family, whose eyes were glued to my every move), my brother blew hot wind into his sermon by telling me there was more strength in the pardon than in the offence itself, and more strength in the mending than in the misguided ways, leaving it very clear that these should be the two sublime counterparts to any fine character, the former represented by my family upon my return, and the latter — the mending of ways — represented by me, the wayward son: ‘You’ve no idea what we’ve been going through in your absence, you’d be shocked at the worn faces of our family; it’s difficult for me to tell you this, brother, but Mother can no longer hide her sobbing,’ he said, blending a sort of increasingly tense feeling of tenderness with his reprimand; he was moving along serenely and surely, somewhat solemnly (like my father), all the while, I was succumbing to rapid vertigo, conjuring up the meagre provisions of this poor family of ours, now deprived of its former strength, and in my darkness, I may just have had a flash of lucidity,

Читать дальше