I
have a friend who still believes in heaven.
Not
a stupid person, yet with all she knows, she literally talks to god,
she
thinks someone listens in heaven.
On
earth she's unusually competent.
Brave,
too, able to face unpleasantness.
We
found a caterpillar dying in the dirt, greedy ants crawling over it.
I'm
always moved by weakness, by disaster, always eager to oppose vitality.
But
timid, also, quick to shut my eyes.
Whereas
my friend was able to watch, to let events play out
according
to nature. For my sake, she intervened,
brushing
a few ants off the torn thing, and set it down across the road.
My
friend says I shut my eyes to god, that nothing else explains
my
aversion to reality. She says I'm like the child who buries her head in the
pillow
so
as not to see, the child who tells herself
that
light causes sadness—
My
friend is like the mother. Patient, urging me
to
wake up an adult like herself, a courageous person—
In
my dreams, my friend reproaches me. We're walking
on
the same road, except it's winter now;
she's
telling me that when you love the world you hear celestial music:
look
up, she says. When I look up, nothing.
Only
clouds, snow, a white business in the trees
like
brides leaping to a great height—
Then
I'm afraid for her; I see her
caught
in a net deliberately cast over the earth—
In
reality, we sit by the side of the road, watching the sun set;
from
time to time, the silence pierced by a birdcall.
It's
this moment we're both trying to explain, the fact
that
we're at ease with death, with solitude.
My
friend draws a circle in the dirt; inside, the caterpillar doesn't move.
She's
always trying to make something whole, something beautiful, an image
capable
of life apart from her.
We're
very quiet. It's peaceful sitting here, not speaking, the composition
fixed,
the road turning suddenly dark, the air
going
cool, here and there the rocks shining and glittering—
it's
this stillness that we both love.
The
love of form is a love of endings.