Translated Accounts (24 page)

Yes, the lawyer smiled, drawing smoke into his lungs, wiping water from the sides of his eyes. Yes, this is the fellow, he gets him.

My older colleague continued, of this personality international person coming from our people, offering lectures to all other peoples while in his other voices speaking many parts, people of our
people, asking questions of international authoritys, historical questions, moral questions, intellectual questions, questions premised from all offerings, reconciliations, and of a more foolish
nature these reconciliations, murdered and murderer, all things.

And when my older colleague paused in this, requiring more breath, I also could speak of the fellow, imitator of voices, and I said, Yes, as these, victim and perpetrator, violated and violator,
inter as between yes, yes, you have murdered me, I forgive you quack quack quack, do not think badly of yourself only murderer, and to orphans of violated women, mutilated men, yes, I forgive you
quack quack quack our rape and murder are nothing, cutting at my breasts and genitals, come to me that I may kiss your cheek quack quack quack, where is your religious house, let me enter that I
may know your most high of most high, that authority, he above all others that I might know to love him as he loves our mothers and fathers, your god, come.

Yes, said my older colleague, but remember also how it was said, if we were helpless in laughter, we all were so.

Yes.

And something further, perhaps you may say it as you have said to others concerning this same fellow.

What?

You have told it to us.

I do not know what it is.

Yes, said my older colleague to the lawyer, this is an important thing, we were talking after one discussion meeting.

Yes, said the younger son.

My older colleague looked again to myself. And all others now looked to me. If I might have answered, or if to have said something. I looked only to the floor, only could do so.

The younger son said to me, I may say it? I remember how you told it to us.

And so he told it. His father had turned from the window, watching him. I listened but did not hear, it was my own story of when the great man, the imitator, was with us. One night we had
journeyed a long distance and had found a location and were resting. It was in one camp. Military so were closeby, we could not accept hospitality from local people, if bringing further
recriminations against themselves. We had not much food, very little, and it was night and it was quiet among us, trying to sleep but it was not good, but for the great man who had begun to speak,
telling all stories, and colleagues listened and found it good, but I could not hear these stories, could not concentrate on any such thing that might happen and why this was, only, that my
companion had returned earlier that day and was there by my side, if I may speak of her, I lay closer to her and how we were not touching, that that could not happen between us in this situation,
and yet people were not fools, it was now known we were together we two, if colleagues saw one they saw two and when the great man was telling all such stories in all such voices in support of
colleagues through this difficult time I could hear nothing, nothing, breathing only in her presence, my companion, and I whispered so to her, and she whispered in reply how when the great man had
been making all colleagues laugh there only was a loudness inside her head, filling her ears and brains, crashing of many voices, many many voices, voices of our people, providing a discordant
thing, lacking all humour and she felt then she might soon be dead.

What more. More. This was that time, difficult time. How it was told by the younger son, I did not hear. All others listened closely to him. Afterwards the father and mother were looking to
myself. It had gone well for their son. I nodded to them but not to their son. I would speak with him, also our older colleague who now gestured with his hand to me, saying, Our people have a love
for stories.

All people, said the lawyer, putting the cigarette to his mouth, now looking to his watch.

She argued how it arrived as a thought, to set down my time on this planet Earth as of a life yet to come, her own life, having the faint recollection, from infancy, sensation
of death, between the anticipation and reality, recognising its similarity to leavetakings such as this one, one of hers, of myself.

Voices were everywhere, peering into our heads, singing in our own rhythms. They are real enough, those reminders. Elderly people know it. She would say it. Some say memories. I do not say
memories for these may not be as they were, and they belonged to her.

Outside of itself knowledge of the source derives from a mixture of fancy and hearsay

She no longer desired knowledge. She said so, looking to myself. She made use of the eyes in my head. Illusions are from inside. She said it to me. It is that my vision is coloured, and always
has been coloured, beginning from separation, from my parents and family. She spoke to me as though understanding was hers, belonging only to herself.

This formed the leavetaking.

I had not set these things down and wonder of these rare occasions when it did fill my head. Not now. Illusions are from inside. Yes. I knew I could. It did not stop me.

What then. I do know these questions, she did not know these questions, not at that more complex time. Such as necessary, as might give

I thought that I may have been

if that I was

Thus that it was false. But it became only false. were-couldby w I wasI thought that i. It was a fantasy while waking and no dream. could could, can feel it nowwe tightly yetwaslingd.

This necessity was the stronger on myself our time was so limited nowas in relating past, if past to the present, why, must I, but if so then as that I might be ruthless.

Much that is said is said needlessly yet the formality may seem necessary.

She thought we might become a history, we so might be one, saying this, whispering this

insufficient, engendering false modes of living

By attempting such a manoeuvre I gave access, was giving access, by virtue of the attempt, giving access

Already false, in the act of consideration. By mapping “the considering” I thought to be offering a demonstration. The distinction between the two lay in the store set unto them

She wanted to tell of her time, herself myself, we two, becoming a history. I would be approaching that method

The arrogance was all that I had but not so herself for whom always lay more than that and from outside of herself, having marked her life since childhood,

since childhood she had marked her life, its moments. The time passed. I now relate some of this, of that life, having had, lives continuing

My heart is a normal heart, signalling my death when the beating stops. Her death as the beating stops

I have no language now. My means of communication are holy, created by myself for myself. Her disappearance now.

I can tell of her time, it may be all that I can do, setting myself here, one thing already known, its existence, by virtue of that, while beyond, considered by ourselves as the possibility, a
possibility. My wife was here and she was mother to a child, my daughter, I was with her and them and we do not know.

At these rare instances an energy was channelled into my body as from the living, I could feel it, I knew. What do you say. Below the window were clouds. I was on a staircase.
There were staircases. Down below it could rain, but if where I was no, it could not. And if falling I would drop through clouds, causing them to burst. These are patterns of thought and imagery
derives from there. I watched four birds, these were doves, one followed one, one followed one.

My eyelids had closed, resting. Always dreams. These are from life, forming life. We were trudging through mud, a valley, by the side of an old track, railway line, as so, I do not think it, do
not know. From the long grass might come an animal. On this occasion any occasion. The area was dangerous and people did not go there. It was that section, of course, there were bodies. We
discovered them, yes in the grass but not only there. It might be as though individuals had lain themselves down toward that purpose, await their own death. People now see it in this way. Now they
do. They have said it to me if these were strange characteristics of people, how people so act, and were these older people only, or younger, men, women, did they so act.

I had climbed from there that evening. At the side of the main entrance was a parapet, the stone surrounding fractured, short flight of steps, I remember. There were ferns, we walked through
them, picking into rubble, see for anything, no not trinkets, not jewellery, sifting gravel, is teeth, and the blades of grass. Weapons. Not food. Weapons, the means by which it might be obtained.
Later by the outer perimeter I walked a route I had come to know, it led me via areas known for danger. I feared others, of course, but this danger also as advantage, it could be adapted. I saw
people, they had manufactured a fire, making tea or coffee, brewing it, the odours, also burning waste, and wood. A girl then was with me. She had lived at the sea, a harbour. She said all there
dreamt of travel. Now she dreamt of home it was returning to there. I told her I also dreamt of the past as future but let it remain so, what it is we are to do.

These people also prepared food. We stood there, not able to leave. I saw some fellow arrive and gesture at us. None responded that I saw. And he came then to us, asking who were we, why we were
there, to where we would travel. I had a bag, I hoisted it onto my shoulders. It was the more simple move, making it and so I did make it. The rain also. It was the time to leave, if this was
possible. If it was not possible. The fellow looked to the girl, yes staring. There was the yellow shawl or scarf, she was wearing it, lace material. He reached with his hand towards it and I saw
worry on her face and she said, No, but he gripped the shawl or scarf, pulling it off, from her shoulders yes others now were staring to her and he now touched her arm where it was bare and I saw
on her face

I could say nothing to him or to them all and wished for something, and if I had something, I had nothing

She had her fingers on the end of the yellow scarf, she gestured at him, it was threatening. How could she threaten it was ludicrous absurdity she should do so and antagonistic to this man
hostile to him, what else it might be. He frowned at this, what else he would do, looking to me quickly. A distance from us I saw one other man raising a hand as to wave but turning his head,
signal also to one other man. The girl also saw and her face. Now my memory entering, seeing her father, arm round her mother and she turned from them that she might not see them for a last time,
spending this last moment not seeing them but these were not here, simply myself, herself myself. What was the girl thinking. She was with me but I do not know. Why she was with me also I do not
know I do not know. I remember it seemed I was sleeping sleeping and salt spray was into my face if from the harbour, lifted beyond that wall, splashing. If I was to vomit I thought I might be, I
was vomiting and the clouds spun and the sudden squawking of the birds, seabirds, noise of the sea, but where was the sea, there was no sea where I then was. If a river was there, yes, I think so,
if from the mountains where rivers may come. These flow downwards, of course it is possible. I remember, it was not in that town, it was beyond, and was rising, land, into mountains, these are from
borders.

During the weeks prior to then we were together, conversations leading to smiles, smiling, soon to silence, discomfort, finally. I said her parents were there. Yes, and other family members. Her
father watched her, thinking I did not notice this, he watched us, thinking how she was with me but I did notice. What could he do, nothing, nor the mother. I was with their daughter, yes, while
they were present. Others too were present. We lay together, as children not as children, whispering not whispering, sharing air to breathe, musty air, and touching, touching, we had a covering,
lay under the covering, we touched yes, yes each other, who, of course. And the securitys might be there, yes. But in the dusk, half light, no light, shadows and dark, darkness, no one to see. We
would remain together as so, if it was possible. I stroked her arm by the scar, there was a scar on her shoulder. Light had faded. She had the scar, I knew it, could feel it also, touch its lines,
and if the security returned. One security did not care. He saw us, he did not care. Other securitys were there, we parted. Not to break the peace between us. Then also the movement of the clouds,
blues, greys. The change had come.

But these others, family, mother, father.

what past, thinking of the past

She studied me, studied her parents, what would become of us. I thought she would choose them. She did not. I touched her with my fingers and she trembled, and inside her, I thought her
sickened, that I witnessed her hatred of myself but this was wrong, she grasped my hand and held it there to be at her my fingers if I was inside her. I was from another place, I did not know, I
had thought an obligation existed and was settling it. I surprised her in an argument with her mother. It was later, it was myself, she argued for myself, for myself. I walked on.

Now by the outer perimeter, burning waste, and wood and she

I saw no other possibility, none other existed.

She could not look at me but with embarrassment. But then as now from her mother, hatred, what else.

I did not know it then. It was to have made a difference and did not. And at that age, no, I do not think so.

I remember her story of leavetaking, her family, that the moment of departure was magical. On a pier listening to the calls of the birds, smells of the sea, vegetation, clarity of air, a fresh
wind nipping her ears, as she said, of her ears being nipped, girl’s ears. At the pier the water lapping against the wooden stanchions, tiny fish among the weeds, also debris, she recalled
debris. What debris? Signs of what? She did not know, but was shaking in excitement, heart resounding, having to grasp her ears. She said how she would place herself by the shutters of windows and
listen for a long period. I listened to her for long periods. I could not tell the time but by the light and the sky, now she might sleep, yet in her mind as she said how her father yet was
watching