...And Dreams Are Dreams

conflagration, after which we never knew where to hide the ash and cinders. Could it be that because they were not allowed to burn Judas in effigy, Christian fanatics and fifth-column activists set fire to the entire land of Judea? No, it is not me who is guilty.”

— 2-

Doña Rosita has overcome her crisis, and Don Pacifico is leading her at a steady pace where he chooses to go. One, two pictures come to her mind: it was midday, on a hill overlooking the sea. The pine trees were small, gnawed by the salt. On the ground, pine needles. Inside her, a dense heat, with no outlet, made her want him very much…. Now he is reviving that scene for her. He is talking to her of dry brushwood, of pine needles, of the burning of the sun, of her own burning. And of his burning. He takes her by the hand. He leads her to a vestibule with heavy red drapes. She identifies with the picture in her mind. She gives herself to him. It all happens in the mind. He covers the weakness of his body with the power of the word. He dominates her. He takes her there where she becomes a sea, a lilac, a flower, a vision, a tree.

He leads her and she lets herself be led because she loves him. Because she trusts him. Because she admires him. Because she respects him. Because she wants him, she wants them to be together, to share the joys and sorrows. She doesn’t care whether he’ll be rich or poor. As long as she sings and he builds. And she shall sing and he shall build when they are together. That’s for certain. But that’s not the point.

That’s not where the problem lies.

So he leads her down the path on the roller skates of his mind. With his mind, he does with her whatever he wants. And she wants him to do with her whatever he wants. She lets herself go. He describes scenes to her: he sees her, he says, naked on a road in the midday sun. He waits for her, hidden among the jasmine. She’s coming, she’s approaching. He sees her having difficulty; an evil neighbor came to her window and gave her the evil eye, he tells her. Yes, he sees her coming, she’s getting closer, he’s among the jasmine.

The jasmine calls to her. She falls finally, naked, into his arms.

The little girl she becomes in his arms rejoices in love, she proclaims it and shouts it out. She likes to hear her own cries. The poor vulnerable girl feels protected in his arms. She believes that he loves her.

This love reinforces her faith. And her faith reinforces her love. Should one of these two supports break, she will come tumbling down. And he doesn’t want her to come tumbling down, does he?

She hurts him. He hurts her. That’s what she says.

What she believes. She is happy. Her entire body overflows with joy. It is a tortured body, he should never forget that. Often, she wants him more than her body can stand.

“I’m strong,” she says. “I’ll survive separating from you.” But she only says that when she’s angry.

When the ancient anger deflates, she feels vulnerable, helpless. “I’m helpless,” she says, “because, as you yourself say, I haven’t two faces, but only one. I’ve abandoned myself completely to love. To my love for you. And I love the whole world too. I love everything in the world. You are the only one I ever let into my solitude. To pillage all that I kept, hermetically, for myself. Now there isn’t a place inside me that isn’t also yours. I want to share everything with you.”

This young woman that he leads with a sure hand along the path of joy, he also loves. Because she is tender and good and joyous and pure. He tries to instill evil in her, just to give her a taste of bitterness, not to make her truly bitter, but she resists him. Her space is marked out with clear borders. There’s nothing mixed up inside her head. She wants love. And love is both of them together, predestined to meet by God, or whatever exists beyond them, because there is a force greater than themselves.

A million attempts to seize her castle, to undermine it, have failed. He tries to put a worm in her that will eat away at her, making the fruit rot. It’s impossible. The ripened fruit is offered to him, that and none other.

She gives him the gift of her sweetness, and he grabs it greedily and keeps it in his safe. Why?

Deprived of sweetness all his life, he craves it. The sweetness of the other. For this he has trained her to walk in her sweetness. By now the path is taken without difficulty. One and two. The sweet road strewn with the honeys of the world. Honey everywhere.

Sweetness everywhere. Everywhere pleasure. Joy. He rejoices. He rejoices.

He leads her. He possesses her. Like a marvel-of-Peru, her face opens and closes according to his mood.

Oriented toward his sun, she turns like a sunflower.