Zbornik Mednarodnega literarnega srečanja Vilenica 2004 - Ljudmila

Txema Martínez Inglés
»Chopin’s heart«
I remember my sister’s fingers
on the black and waxen keys
of the piano at home,
her tiny feet on the pedals
walking softly,
as if they were passing over a dream.
Every afternoon, she learned to play
Chopin, over and over again,
while I did homework or played
on the floor beside her,
below her long ponytail
and a heaven of sheet music.
Every evening, nocturnes were born
from the wooden hammers, we heard them nesting
in the corners of that rented apartment from the seventies,
gliding at the late hour
like resplendent birds nearing the abyss.
One day in June, while grandmother
rinsed strawberries in the kitchen,
the Barcarole surfaced from the void,
shifting, transparent,
as she had never performed it before,
and after listening we were quiet,
we learned silence.
The following day, she left home.
I remember mother
crying at lunch time, father’s hand
putting down the piano cover,
the inconsolable metal sobs.
It took time for the music to stop.
I could still hear the fragile notes
from the walls, the ceiling, through the vents,
down the dark hall, the water pipes,
under the running bath.
When it finally went,
a new silence appeared, not that of absence,
but an intense silence beyond memory,
one we could hear when a door was shut,
eggs were beaten and dishes were cleared,
heaters moved, a voice called me to the table,
speakers came on TV,
and bits and pieces of talk, arguments and laughter
floated over the balconies of tenement houses.
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