THIRSTY IS THE ARID LAND
Liwayway Arceo-Bautista
Translated by Buenaventura S. Medina Jr.
1
Many nights I slept beside her. Like a child I gathered warmth from her breast and listened to the pulse of her heart. But I continued wondering about her deep sighs, her pained stare at everything, her suppressed sobs...
2
I had not gone to the library many days. I had not seen for many days now the image so dear to me: round face, wide forehead, hair parted on the left, slanted eyes, nose not so high, lips that cradled a smile of profound joy... His were my forehead and my eyes. My lean face, my nose like a parrot’s beak, and thin lips, were Mother’s.
3
Mother spoke rarely: she was a woman of few words. She never gave me orders to follow. She rarely scolded me and if ever, her words were brief: Stay aside... And she should not see me anymore. I should not see anymore the anger that would flash in her eyes. I should not see anymore the biting of her lips. I should not see anymore the trembling of her hands. These would also mean the strong don’t when she would not want me to do anything.
Mother’s smile was rain in summer: my child’s heart was arid land...
4
Even once I never heard my Father argue with her although I could never believe that a couple would never quarrel. It must be because that each had a broad sense of understanding: mutuality was not forgiven.
5
Evenings I would seek the joy imparted by a father who would tell tales of giants and gnomes and of beautiful nymphs and princesses. By a mother observing and smiling, by a group of beautiful and happy listening children.
But instead, I would see Father when he wrote: when he typed, when he read. I would see how he would knit his brows: how he would throw smoke from his cigar, how he would look at me as though seeking for something: how he would close his eyes: how he would go on writing...
Mother was a pretty picture when she would be darning clothes: when she would fix the buttons of Father’s shirts. When she embroidered my chemise and handkerchiefs-in the movements of her fingers-I would read an exciting story. But this excitement would vanish.
My aloneness wearied me and I longed for a companion at home: a child in his mischievous age or a lovely baby, with a smile of innocence, with sweet breath, with little feet and hands so tempting to pinch, with cheeks and lips unstained with sin and nice to kiss, or a sister only a year or two younger in whom I could confide...
6
If Mother and Father never quarrelled, or if they did they never let me know, I missed the affectionate exchange of deep stares, of smiles, of teases.
Enough was a cold I’m going when Father would leave. Enough was the collector had come for the light or for the water or for the phone to last the evening meal. Enough was the furtive look to show that he had heard.
I could count with the fingers of my two hands the times when he went out together: Father, Mother, and I. Often I was taken along by Mother: In never saw the two of them alone.
7
Even if sometimes Father would come home when it was almost daybreak, I never saw any change in Mother. She would go to bed when it was time to retire, but I never was certain whether she was able to sleep or not.
Perhaps this is truly what is felt by the spouse of man being possessed by a public.
But there was no bitterness in her voice.
8
A few years had gone since our washerwoman returned a small book. She said she found it in a pocket of Father’s coat. I gave it to Mother. It was Father’s diary.
The next morning, tears had scarred Mother’s eyes. Ever since, she had even become more quiet. To me she looked even more sad.
What was it in a diary?
9
Father was inebriated. Father would usually come home drunk, but his intoxication was different tonight. Mother washed his face with warm tea, but this did not comfort him.
Mother was silent as usual: in her eyes was protest unexpressed.
Because I wanted to write... because I would die of this grief... because... because... because...
10
Now Father complained of his chest and head: he said he could not breathe well.
Perhaps you have a cold, Mother said. You are feverish.
I wound a cold compress around Father’s head. He did not object to what I did: his eyes followed my every moment.
His arms, from elbow to palms, and his legs, from knee to foot, I bathed many times in tepid water which I thought he could bear-water in which were boiled leaves of Alagaw. I covered him with thick blankets after he had drunk the hot calamansi juice I gave him.
Father smiled: My young woman is now a doctor.
I laughed demurely in answer to his smile: Father had never teased me before.
Wish I were Mother then: I would then consider my joy even more precious...
11
My expectations were wrong: Father was ill for days. Mother never left his side: dark lines had encircled her eyes. The doctor said he would do his best. But he would not tell me what ailed Father.
12
Father asked his desk to be fixed. I cleaned his typewriter. I pasted the clippings of his recently published stories. I put together the sheets of paper inside the drawers. The lowest left-hand drawer of his desk gave me a great puzzle: a box of pink felt and a stack of letters. Minute and rounded letters in blue ink spelled Father’s name and his office address on the envelopes.
13
The photograph in the box of felt was not that of the lean face, with an aquiline nose, fragile lips. At the back of it were minute rounded letters in blue ink: Because I cannot forget... the picture was unsigned but at once I began to hate her and learned to nurture a resentment against Father.
14
Why did we meet only now? I could have been more peaceful had you not come into my life, although I could not perhaps bear but barter complacency with love. How true it is that one’s station in life often becomes the barrier to his happiness.
15
We are past the age of rashness: we can no longer be deceived by our feelings. But drawn between us in the gaping truth that arrests happiness; what we cannot realize, let us now only relive in the mind. Let us now only retain in the memory the sweetness of a dream; and wish that we never awaken to reality.
16
I saw her in my dreams last night; she was reproaching me. But, I did not intend to ruin a home. I could not covet her happiness; I could not let her weep because of me. I also love whom you feel part of your life; I cannot allow anyone I love to weep.
17
This love is a play in which I enact the principal role; because I opened it, I should bring it to end. Think of me as a dream fading upon waking. Allow me to banish this grief that strangles me...
18
But why is it hard to forget?
19
I felt Mother’s hand on my right shoulder: it was only then that I realized somebody had come into the library. She saw able to read the letters that were scattered on Father’s desk.
Mother came and left without saying a word. But on her way out her hand once more felt my shoulder and I could still feel the caress of her fingers-their warmth, the weight of their touch...
20
The silence that sprang between Mother and me had not vanished yet. I was now evading her eyes: I could not stand the sadness I saw in them.
21
Father asked for his pen and notebook. But after I had convinced him that rising would not be good for him, he said: Now it would be my daughter who would write about me... And said that skilful hands would inscribe them in black marble. But, I could not render the protestations that I almost smothered.
The cold earth is my glory!
I would never claim that my hands had etched those few words.
22
Do not be deceived by ardour of emotion; the first pulse of heart is not always... I was almost your age when your Mother and I were wed... How very young were eighteen years... Never give yourself the sadness that will torment you all your life...
Once more I felt the tight bond that joined Father’s feelings with mine.
23
I feared Father’s frequent loss of consciousness.
Mother went on not speaking any word to me: went on with only morsel for meals, went on with sleeplessness: went on with private grief...
24
Mother touched Father’s forehead with her right hand and frustrated a trapped feeling from fleeing from the meeting of incisors and lips.
She sat on the edge of Father’s bed and held his right hand in her palms.
I’m well now, my love... I’m well now... when you come again tell me where we can go together... I’ll tear down these walls that imprison me... in whatever way... in whatever...
The warm beads that bordered Mother’s eyes broke and some pelted Father’s arms. Father strove to open his heavy lids and in meeting Mother’s eyes, a smile filled with hope graced his dying lips. Again the windows of his soul were drawn together and he did not see the eyes welled with tears: reflections of the hurt unspoken.
Father’s right hand was still in Mother’s palms: Tell me, my love, that I may claim now my joy...
Mother bit deep her lips and when she spoke I could not believe the voice was hers: You may, my love!
The warmth of Mother’s lips came with peace that descended on Father’s lips and even if in her eyes was the gleam of having failed to wield life, no tears flowed: she was certain now of the contentment of the departed soul...
Liwayway Arceo-Bautista
Translated by Buenaventura S. Medina Jr.
1
Many nights I slept beside her. Like a child I gathered warmth from her breast and listened to the pulse of her heart. But I continued wondering about her deep sighs, her pained stare at everything, her suppressed sobs...
2
I had not gone to the library many days. I had not seen for many days now the image so dear to me: round face, wide forehead, hair parted on the left, slanted eyes, nose not so high, lips that cradled a smile of profound joy... His were my forehead and my eyes. My lean face, my nose like a parrot’s beak, and thin lips, were Mother’s.
3
Mother spoke rarely: she was a woman of few words. She never gave me orders to follow. She rarely scolded me and if ever, her words were brief: Stay aside... And she should not see me anymore. I should not see anymore the anger that would flash in her eyes. I should not see anymore the biting of her lips. I should not see anymore the trembling of her hands. These would also mean the strong don’t when she would not want me to do anything.
Mother’s smile was rain in summer: my child’s heart was arid land...
4
Even once I never heard my Father argue with her although I could never believe that a couple would never quarrel. It must be because that each had a broad sense of understanding: mutuality was not forgiven.
5
Evenings I would seek the joy imparted by a father who would tell tales of giants and gnomes and of beautiful nymphs and princesses. By a mother observing and smiling, by a group of beautiful and happy listening children.
But instead, I would see Father when he wrote: when he typed, when he read. I would see how he would knit his brows: how he would throw smoke from his cigar, how he would look at me as though seeking for something: how he would close his eyes: how he would go on writing...
Mother was a pretty picture when she would be darning clothes: when she would fix the buttons of Father’s shirts. When she embroidered my chemise and handkerchiefs-in the movements of her fingers-I would read an exciting story. But this excitement would vanish.
My aloneness wearied me and I longed for a companion at home: a child in his mischievous age or a lovely baby, with a smile of innocence, with sweet breath, with little feet and hands so tempting to pinch, with cheeks and lips unstained with sin and nice to kiss, or a sister only a year or two younger in whom I could confide...
6
If Mother and Father never quarrelled, or if they did they never let me know, I missed the affectionate exchange of deep stares, of smiles, of teases.
Enough was a cold I’m going when Father would leave. Enough was the collector had come for the light or for the water or for the phone to last the evening meal. Enough was the furtive look to show that he had heard.
I could count with the fingers of my two hands the times when he went out together: Father, Mother, and I. Often I was taken along by Mother: In never saw the two of them alone.
7
Even if sometimes Father would come home when it was almost daybreak, I never saw any change in Mother. She would go to bed when it was time to retire, but I never was certain whether she was able to sleep or not.
Perhaps this is truly what is felt by the spouse of man being possessed by a public.
But there was no bitterness in her voice.
8
A few years had gone since our washerwoman returned a small book. She said she found it in a pocket of Father’s coat. I gave it to Mother. It was Father’s diary.
The next morning, tears had scarred Mother’s eyes. Ever since, she had even become more quiet. To me she looked even more sad.
What was it in a diary?
9
Father was inebriated. Father would usually come home drunk, but his intoxication was different tonight. Mother washed his face with warm tea, but this did not comfort him.
Mother was silent as usual: in her eyes was protest unexpressed.
Because I wanted to write... because I would die of this grief... because... because... because...
10
Now Father complained of his chest and head: he said he could not breathe well.
Perhaps you have a cold, Mother said. You are feverish.
I wound a cold compress around Father’s head. He did not object to what I did: his eyes followed my every moment.
His arms, from elbow to palms, and his legs, from knee to foot, I bathed many times in tepid water which I thought he could bear-water in which were boiled leaves of Alagaw. I covered him with thick blankets after he had drunk the hot calamansi juice I gave him.
Father smiled: My young woman is now a doctor.
I laughed demurely in answer to his smile: Father had never teased me before.
Wish I were Mother then: I would then consider my joy even more precious...
11
My expectations were wrong: Father was ill for days. Mother never left his side: dark lines had encircled her eyes. The doctor said he would do his best. But he would not tell me what ailed Father.
12
Father asked his desk to be fixed. I cleaned his typewriter. I pasted the clippings of his recently published stories. I put together the sheets of paper inside the drawers. The lowest left-hand drawer of his desk gave me a great puzzle: a box of pink felt and a stack of letters. Minute and rounded letters in blue ink spelled Father’s name and his office address on the envelopes.
13
The photograph in the box of felt was not that of the lean face, with an aquiline nose, fragile lips. At the back of it were minute rounded letters in blue ink: Because I cannot forget... the picture was unsigned but at once I began to hate her and learned to nurture a resentment against Father.
14
Why did we meet only now? I could have been more peaceful had you not come into my life, although I could not perhaps bear but barter complacency with love. How true it is that one’s station in life often becomes the barrier to his happiness.
15
We are past the age of rashness: we can no longer be deceived by our feelings. But drawn between us in the gaping truth that arrests happiness; what we cannot realize, let us now only relive in the mind. Let us now only retain in the memory the sweetness of a dream; and wish that we never awaken to reality.
16
I saw her in my dreams last night; she was reproaching me. But, I did not intend to ruin a home. I could not covet her happiness; I could not let her weep because of me. I also love whom you feel part of your life; I cannot allow anyone I love to weep.
17
This love is a play in which I enact the principal role; because I opened it, I should bring it to end. Think of me as a dream fading upon waking. Allow me to banish this grief that strangles me...
18
But why is it hard to forget?
19
I felt Mother’s hand on my right shoulder: it was only then that I realized somebody had come into the library. She saw able to read the letters that were scattered on Father’s desk.
Mother came and left without saying a word. But on her way out her hand once more felt my shoulder and I could still feel the caress of her fingers-their warmth, the weight of their touch...
20
The silence that sprang between Mother and me had not vanished yet. I was now evading her eyes: I could not stand the sadness I saw in them.
21
Father asked for his pen and notebook. But after I had convinced him that rising would not be good for him, he said: Now it would be my daughter who would write about me... And said that skilful hands would inscribe them in black marble. But, I could not render the protestations that I almost smothered.
The cold earth is my glory!
I would never claim that my hands had etched those few words.
22
Do not be deceived by ardour of emotion; the first pulse of heart is not always... I was almost your age when your Mother and I were wed... How very young were eighteen years... Never give yourself the sadness that will torment you all your life...
Once more I felt the tight bond that joined Father’s feelings with mine.
23
I feared Father’s frequent loss of consciousness.
Mother went on not speaking any word to me: went on with only morsel for meals, went on with sleeplessness: went on with private grief...
24
Mother touched Father’s forehead with her right hand and frustrated a trapped feeling from fleeing from the meeting of incisors and lips.
She sat on the edge of Father’s bed and held his right hand in her palms.
I’m well now, my love... I’m well now... when you come again tell me where we can go together... I’ll tear down these walls that imprison me... in whatever way... in whatever...
The warm beads that bordered Mother’s eyes broke and some pelted Father’s arms. Father strove to open his heavy lids and in meeting Mother’s eyes, a smile filled with hope graced his dying lips. Again the windows of his soul were drawn together and he did not see the eyes welled with tears: reflections of the hurt unspoken.
Father’s right hand was still in Mother’s palms: Tell me, my love, that I may claim now my joy...
Mother bit deep her lips and when she spoke I could not believe the voice was hers: You may, my love!
The warmth of Mother’s lips came with peace that descended on Father’s lips and even if in her eyes was the gleam of having failed to wield life, no tears flowed: she was certain now of the contentment of the departed soul...
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