Society lives off illusions, myths, lies. It is so far only given to us at the present moment what we can see with our eyes or reach with our hands. The currency is created in any bank using a computer and the zeros appear with the keyboard struck. Access to it is very scarce and the overwhelming majority struggle not to drown in debt aiming to the life that think they deserve. Science has never been as politicized as it is nowadays. All it takes is for an official foundation to open a line of credit to study global warming (obligatorily demonstrating the threat posed by human activity) or the positive impact of vaccines (implying billionaire profits), or any campaign for the LGBTQIA+, or whatever "grand illusion", never solving the problem of misery or poverty (that's an authoritarian promise from UN but only in 2030)... Friends become scarce, distance themselves, or die. Your wife, or your husband, in the end, doesn't give you a damn. It is better for you to expect to spend your last days alone or, with a bit of luck, to be in line to embrace the sweet death in an asylum. You may believe in faith and embrace a religion, just to listen to your priest seriously advise you: "thrust the Virgin and don't run"...The UN and the WEF proposal of a future to all is nothing else than an "elite" (meaning, having more coins than you) proposal that is laughable and incompetent and devoid of ideas and realism. Where will we stop? Is there still a possible choice between a bankrupt and illusory society and the lonely path with some good company? Is there any intelligence out there or are we alone?
«When power leads man towards arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man’s concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses, for art establishes the basic human truths which must serve as the touchstones of our judgement. The artist, however faithful to his personal vision of reality, becomes the last champion of the individual mind and sensibility against an intrusive society and an officious state.» - John F. Kennedy
Lucas was sent by his mother in a mission: to rescue his father from the hands of malevolent people. From the region of Porto, north of Portugal, he was in the twenties and working in the textile industry, selling silk shirts. He was a men’s shirt seller, on a temporary basis as it is quite common nowadays since the definition of “unemployed” by the Bureau International du Travail in 1931.
”But, mom, where do I go looking for papa?” he asked with a disconsolate expression.
“Somebody kidnapped him, I am sure of that since his last letter. Do you remember the disappearance of Madeleine, the English girl? You should know that a lot of foreign people live in that region, it is dangerous.”
“Why do you assume that?”
“Son, read this letter: «Pilar, I will absent for two months working for Aasif, the son of Sammed, that old friend of mine since the times of civil war in Angola. We have to finish some business. Signed: Veimar», see?!”
Lucas had no authority to contest his mother, born in Vigo, Galicia, and, furthermore, he missed a lot his father, gone for a long time. Besides, he was unemployed at that moment. So, the next morning he took the road on his old and discolored scooter in direction of Algarve, crossing the country throughout less frequented roads. After all, it has just a moped, an old Lambretta, and had not much money for all investigative process. After a few hours, he felt exhausted and decided to stop on a dusty road. Also, at that moment, he already missed his girlfriend and called her on his mobile phone. She was his refuge.
“Hi, Carmen! Are you there?” but at the other side of the phone, he just listens the voice of another guy saying “…with a nice dark silk shirt we are definitively high…colors and properties of the silk…mêh…mêh”, the other voice was from Carmen but was almost imperceptible. He just wanted to reiterate her that he loved her so much but in vain. He hangs up.
Looking around, he noticed a wooden house on the horizon and decided to ask for some water. The owner, Alexis, was a rustic man and with a severe face had an annoying form of communication by whispering. After a moment of hesitation, he invited Lucas to seat on an old garden chair facing the barn door. In the farm, some girls were working in and out of the barn and their mechanical move raised his curiosity. Oddly, they had a concerned look at their faces, they wear not a happy face at all, but the first thought that occurred to him was that the girls were shy. He waved to them a look of sympathy and concern and then noticed that one of the girls was gorgeous. Suddenly he perceived that Alex felt uncomfortable with his sudden interest for the girls, possible for ´that´ girl and Alexis invited him to change and to sit down on a wooden chair.
“You know, we must be exigent toward the working girls. We can’t, unfortunately, thrust them” he shot after a moment of tension and with a rough tone of voice.
“Are you a community? A religious one?” he inquired, intrigued, but at the same time wishing to divert the question.
“Yes, we are a community, it is clear, no? But not a religious one. We are committed to change the world, we are like a Kibbutz, not in Israel, but here in Alentejo. We take care of ourselves, of our problems. We have cures for different afflictions. For depression we make a concoction containing an extraction of the vulva and the penis, mixing with pieces of a black lizard. In Ancient Egypt, they used this remedy, did you know?”
“I didn’t know, really. But I am curious about the way you live and I do need some shelter now. Can I stay this weekend?”
“Maybe, okay, okay. But with one condition: to labor in the fields next morning”.
After the exclusive interlude about their internal medicine, Alexis left apologetically. And again, suddenly, Lucas felt alone and hence he had again to call Carmen. On the other side, the phone reacted and the same voice was speaking “…but the Chinese used red silk shirts to give luck…” Okay, he disconnected the call. He was alone, he said to himself. Well, perhaps not, he believed in a surge of hope. He almost felt that one of the girls going out from the barn was interested somehow in him. At that moment, he needed some love, desperately.
That afternoon he was watering a tomato field when he saw ´that´ very attractive girl coming in his direction. What a ride. Luckily he had no signal inside that area.
“Hello! What are doing here? ” he asked her while attempting to show no interest at all.
“Why shouldn’t I?”
“Oh, it depends.”
“Depends on what?”
Disturbed with the untamed conversation, inadvertently he let the jet of water wet the girl’s chest. Then, he saw with a mix of fear and amusement, the arousing of her nipples.
“Is this what you want? ” she asked with an austere expression in a beautiful and young visage.
In a state of shock and awe, he saw the vigorous Alex coming towards them. Also, with an austere expression and a hammer in his hands. Suddenly, possessed by uncontrollable fear, Lucas left in a hurry the farm. Luckily, he had time to recover his scooter.
And finally, after surviving the weird encounter, he succeeded to arrive in Faro, looking for his father. The Muslim explained had nothing to do with the disappearance of his father. Apparently, Veimar had returned to his homeland, Angola. Lucas saw no way out of the labyrinthic situation. Again, not knowing what to do, he called back his girlfriend with the same scenario. Again, he heard the same voices: «…the Black Plague was conveyed to Europe from the dry plains of Central Asia by the silk road…mêh…mêh…» Intrigued, he also heard back his girlfriend replying for the first time: «…notwithstanding…mêh…mêh…mêh…»
In front of us lies the stage of life and we have to paint and arrange things to live, not necessarily with purpose. It is sad, to have not a good environment to evolve, to create, to think, and express ourselves in a myriad of forms a human being can transform as a product of his extraordinary capacities, making each individual unique (my cat surely think the same right now since she is calling me for some care). Vincent Van Gogh once said: “We spend our whole lives in unconscious exercise of the art of expressing our thoughts with the help of words.” He is an example of someone that wanted to live above the normal stage of life, that wants in striking colors, distorted shapes and primitive brush strokes, to unravel the secrets of life, to express life itself, not in words, but in mysterious pictures.
In general what I read about van Gogh is that he was demented but if we look at each story that intends to depicts him with psychiatric ailments, I see other things, I see van Gogh as a perturbed man, but because he wanted to live intensely at another level of existence, surrounded with lovely people that are hidden under the cover of a society based on reputation and achievements and competition.
As a side story, yesterday it happened something unusual. In my institute, I met by chance a funny and intelligent guy, a scientist from the Nord European hemisphere. And I said in front of my colleagues and with some release of the soul: “Finally, someone fun and intelligent!”. Indeed, nowadays it’s very unusual to meet interesting people, what we meet are people with positions, with the status that they keep as a secret weapon, not giving evidence of qualities wide open to anyone to see. Who wants to be normalized?
-Do you have problems, Jack?
-None. I am problems free.
-How’s that possible?
-No space for them at home…
-Gee! What do you do with problems?
-I give them to the poor. They have nothing, so I give them problems. At the end, they feel as they have something of their own.
Some people say that Time is a healer, but it depends on each one perspective. You can be wounded a second time. I am living proof that this may happen. And not every city are good for people looking for love, but Budapest certainly is. Just to give some weight to my statement I suggest the reading of the novel entitled “Budapest”. The author is a famous Brazilian singer and writer, Chico Buarque de Hollanda. Brazilians, despite being citizens in one of the most politically chaotic countries, they have practically all the paradise corners on Earth. So, this is my humble contribution to the legend…
Széll Kálmán tér, formerly Moszkva tér, i. e., Moscow Square. It is one of the city’s busiest transport interchanges. The central metro station. A crowd crossed the plaza in a busy mood. He has met her a few years before. Well, to be more accurate in Time, twelve years before when he was a Visiting Professor at Eötvös Loránd University, the largest university in Hungary. Now, at his middle age, he returned to give a selected number of talks at Eötvös on political philosophy, and the Department gave to him one apartment contiguous to the apartment where once she lived as a student. Where their passionate relationship had started. That coincidence triggered all memories back again, even if they exchanged only a few letters since that time.
He pulled out from his coat a small piece of paper with straight handwritten instructions, left by her during the previous day in the mailbox. «Take the train at Moskvá Tér in direction of Hösök tere. We meet there».
He took the deep steep descent with the escalator toward the caves of Pest. In the platform, several clocks displayed with rigor the exact time of arrival of the train. With the midst of roar and speed, the train headed to Hösök tere. He was afraid to be in delay, knowing that she was displeased by late arrivals. When he reached the destination, she was already there, near the exit of the underground.
– Just in time! I’m surprised… – she said, with a smile on her face enchanted with deep blue eyes, luminous pink skin, and blonde hair. “She looks like an angel”, he told himself.
– And you look gorgeous!… – He replied, doing his best to be at her level, a penetrating mind, eager to discover the arcane side of life.
– Oh, you are a gentleman. Thank you… – she clearly appreciated the compliment – See? This is Heroes Square, in front the Andrássy Avenue and this semi-circular pillared colonnade is the Millenium Monument, displaying the statue of our kings and leaders that fought for our freedom.
– Oh, you are proud of your country! – He exclaimed, amused, looking deep into her blue eyes.
– Aren’t you of yours? … – she stopped with a gentle interrogation on her face and a melodious tone of voice.
– Not really!… – he replied bluntly.
They visited the nearby museums that surround the Heroes Square, the Museum of Fine Arts, and the Kunsthalle. After the visits, they started silently walking down Andrássy út. This is a magnificent avenue of Budapest with typical buildings of Eastern Europe, certainly enduring in the memory of the refined traveler.
-Are you still fond of your wife? She asked suddenly with a naughty voice while gazing at the majestic buildings.
-How can we define passion? If we like someone, if we are attached to someone, is that passion? – He attempted to defend himself, like in a political cause.
-You are weak… You live with someone that doesn’t love you, that probably even doesn’t make love with you as often as you desire, and you are fond of her. Shame on you! – she riposted.
-And you? Are you now fond of someone? – He tried to divert the focus of the conversation.
-My passion is Life. I am not looking for nothing else but a lover, someone who makes love with me – she stated with a clear voice and no vacillations, looking straight up into the avenue – A lover, a really good lover, is all I want. All the rest has no importance. You guys are all the same.
They continued walking a few more meters in silence until he felt a need to speak.
-You should know that I loved you a lot. You should know it.
-Yeah, yeah. And why you avoided me when I needed you when I request your company when I begged for your support. So many times. You, big Professor! …
-I am not a “big” Professor, you know that.
-Of course, I know. I surpassed you! I have a better position than you now at my university. It was all about, wasn’t it? You were so occupied with your career in Academia, with your stupid wife that didn’t love you.
-In a certain way, it is true what you say now. But I made a judgment error. Life is not about a career, it is about love. And, “at my age” – he stressed intentionally, with a gentle smile on his face – I realized that love is the most important in life, nothing else matters…
-And… “Never opened myself this way, Life is ours, we live it our way, all these words I don’t just say, and nothing else matters” – she sang the old song of Metallica.
-See? I knew you loved that heavy metal band. We still share something – he completed the phrase, looking to that beautiful face and erotic body with a deep desire to make love with her, again, after all these years.
-What?… – she stopped looking straight at him with a kind of feeling, intuition. You still love me?!
-Of course.
She stopped in front of Franz Liszt apartment and proposed to visit what is now a museum. The old lifter was broken and they had to descend the stairs. They descend in silence, again, until she stopped at a corner of the staircase. She undresses the blouse showing her breasts with her typical candid look gazing on him. He took her to the dark corner kissing her lips, neck, and breast with delicacy. He was sure to love that girl, a lot younger than himself.
-Do you still love me? – he asked while kissing, touching her, trying to undress her mini-skirt.
But she was enjoying the moment, just that moment that she waited for so long, with luxury and detachment, not responding to him, however. Do you still love me? …
-Do you still love me?…
-No, I don’t love you anymore – she finally replied, gazing at him with a detached feeling, while he looked at her, surprised, with a profound sadness engraved in his soul.
Then, she pushed him away gently and started to dress again, button-up slowly that white shirt that she often wears without a bra. They descend again the stairs, and he looked at her while she walked away.
Babylon is a marvel of our times with beautiful gardens and temples, crossed by the Euphrates river and carefully defended by canals through which people from all the world can enter the city by many gates at disposal. Finally, I was there for the first time in my trading of timber, after a long and tiresome journey in a caravan from my hometown, Sardis.
I was walking along Marduk Street on my way to the Market when I saw a beautiful woman who I have seen before when traveling across the Royal Road and coming from Sardis, my hometown in Asia Minor. She crossed to a straight transversal street and attracted like a magnet, I went back looking to where she was heading. Her pose and fine traits were outstanding, I may say with certainty. Maybe she was a lost princess, possibly from distant lands of Anatolia, I told to myself.
– I saw you before when traveling across Ecbatana – I told her at the moment I finally reached her, with my voice trembling.
The woman was surprised but with fine manners started to excuse herself for not noticing me before.
– It’s me that ask your pardon, beautiful princess. I was on my way to the Market where I hope to sell some gold coins. And you, where are you going if it is not being too audacious to ask.
– I was looking at the Market, too, but these small streets seem so full of life…and I got lost inside their meanders.
– No doubt…May I join you? – With a gentle smile, she accepted.
They walked along the narrow streets inside the Imperial city when they found some people gathered around a squared table, like a chess game that instead of pawns, queens and kings, had naked statues of female and male. The game was simple, each player chooses the statue and another player had his/her choice, and they touched each statue, feeling unusual shivering. He was surprised for the libertine context around and the woman becomes genuinely embarrassed. Then, as if she were a sinner, she told him: «I need to leave to the Temple…»
They continued to walk again together and further down the corner, two women were apparently playing with each other, the youngest holding the oldest by the back, by the cheeks, having their bodies static but after a short while the youngest start forcing the cheeks in a clearly painful way and then the oldest start saying, «Stop, my daughter, you are hurting me» and the youngest replied, aloud, «Why did you spend my money in the lotteries! Why??».
Then, already near the big Temple were the Princess were supposed to stay, several clay figures of blazing woman holding their hands over their chest were being sold, and the seller was repeatedly telling what anyone foreigner would say in respect for the Lord, that ‘I am, and there is no one else besides me.’ I was attentive to all my surrounding, a habitude I developed as a necessary condition of a successful young trader when I heard two old women telling to each other in a conspiracy mood: «See? In this Temple, priestess indulges in sex from behind **…»
Finally, while we walked silently towards the entrance of the Temple I become aware that I could possess the heart of this princess provided had more time to build a true and respectful friendship with her. Then, she stopped, looked at me, and said in a mood of confession: «I know that my redeemer liveth». Then, I held softly her hand and, maiden-like, I returned: «You will come in my dreams».
Now, I live with this insane thought tormenting me all along my longest and loneliest journeys crossing the most beautiful desertic lands of the Earth, because in my pure soul of a simple citizen of Sardis I knew that Babylon corrupted me.
** During Roman times the expression “coitus a tergo” was used.
Walking along the streets of the city, he realized that for a long while she hadn’t called him back, as she used to do before. The cold air from the mountains and the gray lights from the Sun perpetuated his feeling of loneliness. He was in his mid-fifties and his wife, much younger, left him for that same reason. He was too old for her. Until then, he had a total and exclusive relationship with her. He loved the nonchalant way she walked, when he caught sight of her in the distance, from his office at the Department of Literature, just before the lesson she attended. His Lessons. One day, she went to his tutorial class, and while he discussed the philosophy behind English drama, he was thrilled to see her look back at him with intensity, while slowly unbuttoning the coat. The reminiscence, L’écume des jours, as we might say, were frequently in his mind, trying to understand the reason why she left him so early (he thought).
“We must leave before separation happens…It is the classic move, everybody knows.” Oh, so many times he saw that strange look when a woman wants, wishes to abandon her lover.
“Catherine, let me in!” he whispered with his trembling voice while attempting to unlock the door with his cold hands. She opened the door, one more time, and then splashed some water on his face, laid him on the bed, undressing him slowly, warming his nude body with her nude body. And in a faint, insatiable voice, he begs her “Don’t leave me, don’t leave me”. What he thought to be unbreakable bonds, were in fact, miracles of the existence.