True at First Light

Something, or something awful or something wonderful was certain to happen on every day in this part of Africa.

We were no longer, technically, children although in many ways I am quite sure that we were. Childish has become a term of contempt. "Don't be childish, darling." "I hope to Christ I am. Don't be childish yourself." It is possible to be grateful that no one that you would willingly associate with you say, "Be mature. Be well-balanced, be well-adjusted." Africa, being as old as it is, makes all people except the professional invaders and spoilers into children. No one says to anyone in Africa, "Why don't you grow up?" . . . Men know that they are children in relation to the country and, as in armies, seniority and senility ride close together. But to have the heart of a child is not a disgrace. It is an honor. A man must comport himself as a man. . . . But it is never a reproach that he has kept a child's heart, a child's honesty and a child's freshness and nobility.

We made love and then made love again and then after we had made love once more, quiet and dark and unspeaking and unthinking and then like a shower of meteors on a cold night, we went to sleep.

There is no such word as love. Just as there is no word for sorry.

There are always mystical countries that are a part of one's childhood. Those we remember and visit sometimes when we are asleep and dreaming. They are as lovely at night as they were when we were children. If you ever go back to see them they are not there. But they are as fine in the night as they ever were if you have the luck to dream of them.

Dante only made crazy people feel they could write great poetry. That was not true of course but then almost nothing was true and especially not in Africa. In Africa a thing is true at first light and a lie by noon and you have no more respect for it than for the lovely, perfect weed-fringed lake you see across the sun-baked salt plain. You have walked across that plain in the morning and you know that no such lake is there. But now it is there absolutely true, beautiful and believable.

The cider tasted like Michigan too and I always remembered the cider mill

[...] and Mary with her wonderful memory for forgetting was happy too and without any problems. She could forget in the loveliest and most complete way of anyone I ever knew. She could carry a fight overnight but at the end of week she could forget it completely and truly. She had a built-in selective memory and it was not built entirely in her favor. She forgave herself in her memory and she forgave you too. She was a very strange girl and I loved her very much.

In the chair, watching the fire and thinking of Pop and how sad it was that he was not immortal, and how happy I was that he had been able to be with us so much, that we’d been lucky enough to have three or four things together that were like the Old Days along with just the happiness of being together and talking and joking, I fell asleep.

Mary's extremely nice cousin had given us two small square sacking-covered pillows filled with balsam needles. I always slept with mine under my neck or, if I slept on my side, with my ear on it. It was the smell of Michigan when I was a boy and I wished I could have had a sweet-grass basket to keep it in when we traveled and to have under the mosquito net in the bed at night.

You know. Don’t pretend you don’t know.

Pray for anything you like, if it is for the good of us all. -I pray for beer, for meat and for a new wife with hard hands. You can share the wife.

Há sempre países mágicos que fazem parte da nossa infância. Os que nos vêm à memória e que visitamos quando dormimos e sonhamos. São tão maravilhosos à noite como quando eramos crianças. Se alguma vez voltamos para os ver, desvanecem-se. Mas à noite não perdem nada da antiga beleza se tivermos a sorte de sonhar com eles

Aproximávamo-nos agora da floresta enquanto a estrada ia descrevendo uma volta quando demos pelas pegadas de um homem. Depois de outro homem que trazia botas. As marcas mostravam ligeiros sinais de chuva e parámos o carro para ver melhor a pé. - Tu e eu – disse a Ngui. - Sim – disse ele com um sorriso – Um deles tem pés grandes e caminha como se estivesse cansado. - Um está descalço e anda como se a espingarda fosse pesada demais para ele. Pára o carro – disse a Mthuka. Descemos. - Olha – disse Ngui. – Um anda como se fosse muito velho e mal pudesse ver. O que está calçado. - Olha – disse eu – O que está descalço anda como quem tem cinco mulheres e vinte vacas. Gastou uma fortuna em cerveja. - Não vão chegar a lado nenhum – disse Ngui – Olha, o que vai calçado anda como se fosse morrer de um momento para o outro. Vai a cambalear com o peso da espingarda. - Que achas que andam a fazer por estes lados? - Como é que hei-de saber? Olha, o dos sapatos agora está mais forte. - Está a pensar na shamba – disse Ngui. - Kwenda na shamba. - Ndio – confirmou Ngui – Que idade dás tu ao mais velho, o dos sapatos? - Não tens nada com isso – disse eu. Dirigimo-nos para o carro e quando ele se aproximou subimos e eu indiquei a Mthuka a orla da floresta. O condutor ria-se e abanava a cabeça. - Que é que andavam os dois ali a fazer a seguir as vossas pegadas? – disse Miss Mary – Já sei que era muito engraçado porque todos se estavam a rir. Mas pareceu-me bastante parvo