Читать книгу Grove - Esther Kinsky - Страница 8

vii / morți

IN ROMANIAN CHURCHES believers light candles in two separate places. It might be two niches in the wall, two ledges, or two metal cabinets, where the candles flicker. On the left side of the partition are the candles for the living; on the right side, the candles for the dead. If someone dies for whom in life a candle was lit in the left partition, then the burning candle is transferred to the right partition. From vii to morți.

I have only observed the tradition of lighting candles in Romanian churches; I have never practiced it myself. I have watched the candles flicker in their intended places. I have deciphered the letters above the partitions—simple niches in a wall, ledges, filigree containers made from forged iron or perforated sheet metal—and I have read them as names, designating the one space for hope, vii, and the other for memory, morți. One group of candles illuminates the future, the other the past.

I once saw a man in a film take a candle that was flickering for a relative in the niche of the vii and move it into the niche of the morți. From what-shall-be to once-was. From the fluttering of the future to the stillness of a remembered picture. In the film this observance was moving in its simplicity and acceptance, but at the same time it inspired disgust, obedient and impersonal, a mutely followed rule.

A few months after I saw this scene in a film, M. died. I became bereaved. Before bereavement, one might think of “death,” but not yet of “absence.” Absence is inconceivable, as long as there is presence. For the bereaved, the world is defined by absence. The absence of light in the space of the vii overshadows all flickering in the space of the morți.