There was a village, many years ago, with people full of happiness because even if the food on the table were simple, they could talk to each other. More than that, they could tell each other their secrets, their longings, their pains. They could tell their beloved if they sensed in their heart that something was wrong—or lacking or missing or too much—in the lives they were leading together.
One day, by the grace of the full moon, they went to the middle of the village to elect the leader. Out of the throng was this simple man, with simple ways. Or so they thought. While other leaders spoke loftily of the ideals taught by them by their ancestors, stories that were carried by the wind and the waves, this man spoke from the heart. Or so they thought.
It was something new. Leaders in that village were reared to respect the Sun, the Moon and the ways of the Stars. When they spoke, they think of the person’s position and nature: Is the person a woman or a wife? Is the person a believer of a different divinity (for in that village, there were so many notions of the divine and the afterlife)? Is the person someone who had braved the storm to gather food from different islands so he or she could feed the family?
This man was odd: he made false, funny tales that made people laugh. As the village was enclosed, they grew up and grew old aware of boundaries, of lines and markers that reminded them where to go and where to stop and what to say and what to keep quiet about. This leader made them forget about those lines, about those boundaries. The noisier among them shouted: Enough of these! Burn the limits! Scar the lines!
The village—a big number of them—chose this leader to carry the village as it hummed across the universe of deep seas and giant mountains.
At first, the leader seemed to be one of them. He shared what made him happy and he spoke of what made him sad. But as days went on, he started to show more anger. Every now and then, the people would be puzzled: is he doing something good for us.
He continued to be angry and he went on breaking lines. There were no lines he did not cross; there were no gates he did not breach. He entered the rooms of couples and commented on their bodies. He kissed every woman who stood near him. He threatened those who also showed anger towards him.
He had people who followed him, who initiated rites that destroyed boundaries. He paid men and women to make fun of others who started to find him not funny anymore.
The village of happy people started to be silent. It was good for them. For people whose gift was sound and joy, silence appeared to be the strongest wall. No one could penetrate their silence. Or so they thought.
But the women and men this leader paid with gold and silver were themselves silenced before. They knew the power of silence and they knew, in their pomp, that silence must not be allowed to go on.
One man, a man of law and logic, was divine in his ability to read the silences of people. In those silences, he carved his most cruel and dumbest epithets. His epigrams were destructive because they came from the well of senselessness colored by the most acidic of smiles. Remember this village was where a smile was currency circulated among kinsmen to bind them together. This currency was used to acquire power and submission.
The leader also paid witches. These were women who have sold their bodies to all the cruel men in the land and to all the devils possible in the universe. They had nothing to lose and so they talked and talked in a language that, for some reason, entertained those who were getting bored with the chosen leader. You could not fight with them with reason because their language was not born of any meaning.
This went on and on. Silence became gold in that village made poor by viciousness.
In that village, there was one group of ritualists. They were men and women who had, as they say,
direct line to the gods. They, too, had been quiet. In the tales of the village, these men and women saved them from cruel giants and vicious invaders. Now, they were quiet, too. It was only in their quarters secluded from the rest that they broke their silences
They started to talk among each other. On one of these gatherings, the oldest among them gathered a document and from it selected a fragment from a sheaf called “Sonatina.” Here is what he read: Listen, the world is no longer/So simple. It is no respecter/Of tenderness. Ripening,/It crumples like a fruit./Prepare yourself. Sorrows past/Are sorrows still to come.
The words were pure. They looked at each other in silence. The oldest among them mumbled: The gods are not happy anymore. We have stolen from them what made them divine.
There was silence among them again. The youngest among them asked: what do the gods want us to do? The old man replied: Talk! Be noisy! Be heard. Only gods are supposed to be silent.
The poem are quoted from Sonatina by Marne Kilates who, I assume, is a beloved poet of the village of sorrowful silences.
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Image credits: Jimbo Albano