Beacon

“Ces malédictions, ces blasphèmes, ces plaintes,
Ces extases, ces cris, ces pleurs, ces Te Deum,
Sont un écho redit par mille labyrinthes;
C’est pour les coeurs mortels un divin opium!

C’est un cri répété par mille sentinelles,
Un ordre renvoyé par mille porte-voix;
C’est un phare allumé sur mille citadelles,
Un appel de chasseurs perdus dans les grands bois!

Car c’est vraiment, Seigneur, le meilleur témoignage
Que nous puissions donner de notre dignité
Que cet ardent sanglot qui roule d’âge en âge
Et vient mourir au bord de votre éternité!”

She mumbles quickly but confidently with an eloquent French accent. In a dispassionate stupor, she suddenly awoke me out of a monotonous schema that I have set for myself.

“How is it possible?” I ask silently.

How is this same person the one who paces the hardwood floor, endlessly reminding, confirming, and repeating to herself “yeah”, “mhm”, “yup”? How is this the same woman who needs to maintain a 30 feet tether to me at all times? How is this same woman tormented by the uncertainty of the 6pm dish schedule?

“Rubens, river of oblivion, garden of indolence, 
Pillow of cool flesh where one cannot love, 
But where life moves and whirls incessantly 
Like the air in the sky and the tide in the sea”

I read from the computer screen.

I think of her standing, hovering, watching clothes spin in the chaotic order of the washing machine. Everyday petrified, the machine will break. I think of her pacing up and down the corridor. “How’s it going?” She asks over and over and over again. Everyday petrified, vigilant that suddenly, violently, they too will break.

“Leonardo, dark, unfathomable mirror, 
In which charming angels, with sweet smiles 
Full of mystery, appear in the shadow 
Of the glaciers and pines that enclose their country”

I close my eyes and hear two people speaking at once. Full of mystery, I do not know who she is. Both pure and angelic and dark and unfathomably haunted.

I remember the bio of the young prodigee as I look at the aging woman wearing the ragged dress gown which she wears to bed. I look at her shaggy brown hair with frills of gray descending down her face.

I ask how two opposing truths can exist at once. I ask how she can she bear it all.

Day by day, her memory will continue to fade.

There is no resolution or meaningful explanation in sight. This is her life and that is all there is.

I close my eyes and remember…

“Yup” “Mhm” “Okay” I hear repeated over and over again.

Paces the hall from dawn to dusk asking if everyone is doing okay.

Like a child, asks if she can go outside. Like a child, tells me she finished her chore. Like a child, always afraid of being scolded. Like a child, always staying close to home.

She counts, recounts, counts, and recounts

Leaving for the train station on a warm sunny day with a rain coat and umbrella. She takes a deep breath and walks off.

“Rembrandt, gloomy hospital filled with murmuring, 
Ornamented only with a large crucifix, 
Lit for a moment by a wintry sun, 
Where from rot and ordure rise tearful prayers”

Never a tear or complaint. Never a word of lamentful reflection. It is as if it has always been this way. A fond remembrance of what was and a total contentedness of her present state. Rarely leaving the house, waiting for someone else to turn the television on: the same patterns repeat day after day.

She stands there, shoulder blades contracting together. I remember that next week is her 50th birthday. She will now have lived here for ten years. And she still has never spoken of her Schizophrenia.

Non-chalantly, standing by my side, we finish the last verses of Boudelaire’s Les Phares, but now in English.

These curses, these blasphemies, these lamentations, 
These Te Deums, these ecstasies, these cries, these tears, 
Are an echo repeated by a thousand labyrinths; 
They are for mortal hearts a divine opium.

They are a cry passed on by a thousand sentinels,
An order re-echoed through a thousand megaphones;
They are a beacon lighted on a thousand citadels,
A call from hunters lost deep in the woods!

For truly, Lord, the clearest proofs 
That we can give of our nobility, 
Are these impassioned sobs that through the ages roll, 
And die away upon the shore of your Eternity.

“Like lighthouses” she explains. “A journey through all of time.”

“I used to carry his book with me everywhere.” She exclaims thoughtfully.

“It is better in French”

I sit quietly, looking at her shaggy brown hair with frills of gray, full of awe and wonder.

“Thank you” is all that I can say.

And she slowly returns to the hallway, hovering by the office door.

“Yup” “Mhm” “Okay”

Citations:

Baudelaire, Charles. Flowers of Evil. Les Phares (The Beacons). https://fleursdumal.org/poem/105

Translation by Roy Campbell, Poems of Baudelaire (New York: Pantheon Books, 1952)