Authors: David Grossman
Be My Knife (33 page)
After about fifty times, hearing people fucking not a meter away from me doesn’t excite me anymore.
In the beginning it did, yes, even against my will and conscience—the moans alone did it—and they echo from every corner of this building twenty-four hours a day.
Sometimes I think I keep hearing them even after whoever has been silent for a while.
(Like the way Ido would sob and yell when I dropped him off at kindergarten—I would keep hearing it all day.)
In the beginning it did, yes, even against my will and conscience—the moans alone did it—and they echo from every corner of this building twenty-four hours a day.
Sometimes I think I keep hearing them even after whoever has been silent for a while.
(Like the way Ido would sob and yell when I dropped him off at kindergarten—I would keep hearing it all day.)
But—no longer.
I guess I’ve grown used to it.
I’m training myself to think of it more positively: for two and a half days I have been living in a huge engine room, with the noise and regular rhythms of increasingly louder piston squeaks.
And the usual steam being expelled.
And after a minute, everything begins all over again in another room.
Sometimes I think all the rooms above and around me are trembling together—everything is shaking, vibrating—the beds squeak, the men moan, and the girls, each one in turn, let out their fake shouts—
I guess I’ve grown used to it.
I’m training myself to think of it more positively: for two and a half days I have been living in a huge engine room, with the noise and regular rhythms of increasingly louder piston squeaks.
And the usual steam being expelled.
And after a minute, everything begins all over again in another room.
Sometimes I think all the rooms above and around me are trembling together—everything is shaking, vibrating—the beds squeak, the men moan, and the girls, each one in turn, let out their fake shouts—
What I find strange is that, apart from the hotel owner, I haven’t yet seen a living soul here.
Every time I leave my room, the place looks empty and abandoned.
Every time I leave my room, the place looks empty and abandoned.
If we ever sleep together, we will make love slowly, as if we were doing it in our sleep—I can see it now—like two embryos searching for each other, in slow motion, our eyes closed …
Miriam, I worked through the night.
I felt as if I had to fight for myself a little bit (or at least honorably represent you in the battle over me).
You can’t surrender to this without a battle.
The voices around me were starting to drive me out of my mind.
I taped all your letters on the walls.
Hard labor.
I never realized how much you wrote to me.
I wonder what emotions would pass through you, if you were here.
I felt as if I had to fight for myself a little bit (or at least honorably represent you in the battle over me).
You can’t surrender to this without a battle.
The voices around me were starting to drive me out of my mind.
I taped all your letters on the walls.
Hard labor.
I never realized how much you wrote to me.
I wonder what emotions would pass through you, if you were here.
I’m exhausted and dizzy, I’m dying to get some sleep—but can’t wipe this idiotic grin off my face.
(Dream about sleeping.) Of all things.
I am suddenly sizzling, full of energy—feeling that the walls are murmuring your words.
I am suddenly sizzling, full of energy—feeling that the walls are murmuring your words.
The room is confusing and full of motion right now.
It makes me dizzy to look at.
It was like composing a huge crossword puzzle (meant to define its composer).
In the beginning I made sure to keep every family of pages together—I couldn’t—I despaired over the mess—everything was flying out of my hands and getting mixed up.
In the last hour of doing it, I just taped up whatever came into my hands first.
I created hybrids—blind dates—doesn’t matter.
You have a natural sequence about you—somehow everything you wrote is coded with it, continues in an unending flow of conversation.
Hey, now I can make up my own new game of chance.
I walk on my bed with closed eyes, open them, and the first sentence that jumps out—“ … and until now, I could remember the physical feeling of terror that used to creep in and fill me, turn into stone in the place where I kept my joy of living; oh, the terror that anything good in me will not be given to anyone—and will go unwanted forever.
Then why should I exist?”
It makes me dizzy to look at.
It was like composing a huge crossword puzzle (meant to define its composer).
In the beginning I made sure to keep every family of pages together—I couldn’t—I despaired over the mess—everything was flying out of my hands and getting mixed up.
In the last hour of doing it, I just taped up whatever came into my hands first.
I created hybrids—blind dates—doesn’t matter.
You have a natural sequence about you—somehow everything you wrote is coded with it, continues in an unending flow of conversation.
Hey, now I can make up my own new game of chance.
I walk on my bed with closed eyes, open them, and the first sentence that jumps out—“ … and until now, I could remember the physical feeling of terror that used to creep in and fill me, turn into stone in the place where I kept my joy of living; oh, the terror that anything good in me will not be given to anyone—and will go unwanted forever.
Then why should I exist?”
(I did another round, and drew the very same page!)
“ … and I have begun to suspect that ‘that thing’ might not even be given from no person to no person, and that all the others have known this for a long time, and that maybe this is the big secret that makes it possible for them to live.
I mean, ‘to live’ and to ‘find mates’ and to paint a house with a roof and a chimney together.
To be the wise lovers from Natan Zakh’s poem:
I mean, ‘to live’ and to ‘find mates’ and to paint a house with a roof and a chimney together.
To be the wise lovers from Natan Zakh’s poem:
A visitor won’t come on such a night
And if he comes—don’t open the door.
It’s late,
And only cold is blowing in the world.
And if he comes—don’t open the door.
It’s late,
And only cold is blowing in the world.
“But I never forget how lucky I was to have met a couple of unwise lovers, who, on such a night, opened the door for me.”
Yair?
Yair, wake up, it’s me
…
Yair, don’t fall asleep again …
…
Yair, don’t fall asleep again …
This is how I keep myself awake, saying my name with your mouth, in your tune—and each time my heart beats to my name in your mouth.
I’m beginning to be afraid of sleep.
I know that as soon as I succeed in
sinking into it, for a moment, forgetting where I am, I’ll hear a shout outside, or a moan, or bedsprings, and I can’t—It’s been like this for three nights.
I know that as soon as I succeed in
sinking into it, for a moment, forgetting where I am, I’ll hear a shout outside, or a moan, or bedsprings, and I can’t—It’s been like this for three nights.
The end of your letter with your “theory,” after you told me I should try to write stories, you wrote:
Yair—
Yair Yair—
Shine on
But where am I?
And where is the Yair who shines?
And where is the Yair who shines?
It’s night again.
Where did the days go?
Where did the days go?
I am becoming more empty, and you are becoming real.
Your pacing through the house, from the kitchen through the hallway to the balcony; the shade of the bougainvillea falling in embroidery on your arms; the scent of your hand lotion rising all around me from your pages—it wraps me up in the feeling of a home here.
You are created in me again and again.
We are not alive, remember?
But everything you wrote is alive.
Your life is alive to me.
Your face—going over every line, painting it all in my head, dressing you, stripping you slowly, slowly, one piece of clothing after another—talking to myself in your precise speech, in your written voice, with the delicate sorrow around the edges.
We are not alive, remember?
But everything you wrote is alive.
Your life is alive to me.
Your face—going over every line, painting it all in my head, dressing you, stripping you slowly, slowly, one piece of clothing after another—talking to myself in your precise speech, in your written voice, with the delicate sorrow around the edges.
“It’s no longer a secret,” you say (precise, exact reference?
Two fingers over to the right from the door), “that these surprising likenesses run between us.
I can sometimes feel them flowing through these letters like lines of electricity, with the tension, the constant trembling, and the danger.
But, of course, you know that this likeness extends to what you call ‘the murky twists and turns of the soul’ as well, among other things—but in these ‘twists and turns,’ more than in anything—exists a power like I have never known.
So maybe you can understand why I so want to be close to the one who echoes back to me the least favorite parts of myself.”
Two fingers over to the right from the door), “that these surprising likenesses run between us.
I can sometimes feel them flowing through these letters like lines of electricity, with the tension, the constant trembling, and the danger.
But, of course, you know that this likeness extends to what you call ‘the murky twists and turns of the soul’ as well, among other things—but in these ‘twists and turns,’ more than in anything—exists a power like I have never known.
So maybe you can understand why I so want to be close to the one who echoes back to me the least favorite parts of myself.”
I don’t know.
I don’t know much in general.
It’s not easy for me to discover, as you are spread out all around me, that your questions are always far more profound than my answers.
As for that question—you had
better answer it for yourself, first—here, what you wrote, when we were sister and brother for a moment, prisoners in a chain gang, shuffling in opposite directions, moving farther and farther apart: “ … I want to submerge myself in all the channels of your emotions and passions, your exposed and most secret, and the wave-crashes and the twisting, because the place from which they spring, all of them, even the one that led you to the prostitute, is for me a place of genesis, a living, precious spring, which I am searching for …”
I don’t know much in general.
It’s not easy for me to discover, as you are spread out all around me, that your questions are always far more profound than my answers.
As for that question—you had
better answer it for yourself, first—here, what you wrote, when we were sister and brother for a moment, prisoners in a chain gang, shuffling in opposite directions, moving farther and farther apart: “ … I want to submerge myself in all the channels of your emotions and passions, your exposed and most secret, and the wave-crashes and the twisting, because the place from which they spring, all of them, even the one that led you to the prostitute, is for me a place of genesis, a living, precious spring, which I am searching for …”
Night inside night inside night.
This man no longer thinks about anything anymore, he doesn’t even think about the mumps or his poor balls—this man only wants to sleep, sleep until the nightmare ends, and then forget everything.
This man sliced the telephone line in his room with a knife, the trouble being that he almost called you to ask you to come to me.
This man no longer thinks about anything anymore, he doesn’t even think about the mumps or his poor balls—this man only wants to sleep, sleep until the nightmare ends, and then forget everything.
This man sliced the telephone line in his room with a knife, the trouble being that he almost called you to ask you to come to me.
You just missed a great moment: the landlord burst in without knocking on the door—or maybe he did knock and I didn’t hear it (I have wads of toilet paper rolled up in my ears to try and shut out some of the noise)—and he caught me standing on the bed reading from the wall.
This is how I occupy most of my days here.
He saw the pages plastered over every inch of the walls.
He wanted to say something, but didn’t dare.
He went mute—and I just went with the full brilliance of that moment and started reading aloud—“ … overcome, and aroused, as I am, by a mad passion in me to play your strange game, after all.
To meet with you, yes, only in words, as you suggested.
To become wild on the page—to be mixed up in your imagination, and see how far you can sweep me away.”
This is how I occupy most of my days here.
He saw the pages plastered over every inch of the walls.
He wanted to say something, but didn’t dare.
He went mute—and I just went with the full brilliance of that moment and started reading aloud—“ … overcome, and aroused, as I am, by a mad passion in me to play your strange game, after all.
To meet with you, yes, only in words, as you suggested.
To become wild on the page—to be mixed up in your imagination, and see how far you can sweep me away.”
You should have seen his face—a rare, complex expression, the combination of amazement and horror—perhaps he thought I was inventing, in this modest little room, some new perversion that even he hasn’t encountered as yet.
I lifted one hand in the air and focused my eyes on the wall: “It has become quite clear to me that you play this game terribly well—with a little whispering feminine intuition that in matters of words and imagination, you are ‘the best.’
Certainly better than in anything you do in life.
And why shouldn’t I meet you at your best?”
I lifted one hand in the air and focused my eyes on the wall: “It has become quite clear to me that you play this game terribly well—with a little whispering feminine intuition that in matters of words and imagination, you are ‘the best.’
Certainly better than in anything you do in life.
And why shouldn’t I meet you at your best?”
He left, slowly closing the door behind him with the kind of respect
you have for the truly insane.
I am, undoubtedly, beginning to acquire a status here.
you have for the truly insane.
I am, undoubtedly, beginning to acquire a status here.
Still night.
No rest, writing while lying down, twisted around myself, the unending murmurs of your words and your thoughts and memories covering me, from all sides, at all times, flowing through me, leaving and entering my body like water.
Anna’s cheerful, crowded house—with her three brothers and her parents and their funny Dutch Hebrew—and her father’s free piano lessons—“And now, after ze Brahms, ve vill play Edelveiss Glide of Vanderbeck for ze plain joy of a coffeehouse.”
Your mother was constantly envious, she tried to keep you from spending every free moment over there—with her twitching, pursed smile, which always seemed as if it were hurrying away to sweep any traces it might have left in the world.
I don’t dare imagine what she said, and what black essence she spit out when it turned out there was something wrong with Yokhai.
No rest, writing while lying down, twisted around myself, the unending murmurs of your words and your thoughts and memories covering me, from all sides, at all times, flowing through me, leaving and entering my body like water.
Anna’s cheerful, crowded house—with her three brothers and her parents and their funny Dutch Hebrew—and her father’s free piano lessons—“And now, after ze Brahms, ve vill play Edelveiss Glide of Vanderbeck for ze plain joy of a coffeehouse.”
Your mother was constantly envious, she tried to keep you from spending every free moment over there—with her twitching, pursed smile, which always seemed as if it were hurrying away to sweep any traces it might have left in the world.
I don’t dare imagine what she said, and what black essence she spit out when it turned out there was something wrong with Yokhai.
Yokhai.
A lot of Yokhai.
A lot of Yokhai.
You know, ever since you told me about his fits, his rages, I look at anything beautiful twice.
Once for me—and once for you.
To make it up to you in my own limited way—for the beauty you can’t surround yourself with in your own home, that beauty I know you need like air for breath.
Whenever I do, I feel, again, how blind I am—indifferent and hasty—and am afraid, again, that I’ve lost the first natural passion for beauty for good.
Once for me—and once for you.
To make it up to you in my own limited way—for the beauty you can’t surround yourself with in your own home, that beauty I know you need like air for breath.
Whenever I do, I feel, again, how blind I am—indifferent and hasty—and am afraid, again, that I’ve lost the first natural passion for beauty for good.
Your name.
I haven’t told you.
I say “Miriam” to myself more and more, replacing so many other words—Miriam is understand—come—accept me—I feel good—I feel bad—secret—to grow—silence—your breasts—your heart—to breathe—clemency.
I haven’t told you.
I say “Miriam” to myself more and more, replacing so many other words—Miriam is understand—come—accept me—I feel good—I feel bad—secret—to grow—silence—your breasts—your heart—to breathe—clemency.
Still, didn’t you want another child?
Were you scared?
Are you trying at all, or do you want to give the whole of yourself only to Yokhai?
You are so silent about these matters, still holding your clenched hands close to your sides.
Were you scared?
Are you trying at all, or do you want to give the whole of yourself only to Yokhai?
You are so silent about these matters, still holding your clenched hands close to your sides.
You were right in your decision not to write down the “formal” name of his disease—so that the name won’t gradually replace his.
Until what age will you be able to keep him at home (and how?
How have you been able to not put him into an institution until now?).
Until what age will you be able to keep him at home (and how?
How have you been able to not put him into an institution until now?).
He’ll start growing up soon, and the difficulties will grow with him—I’m not telling you anything new.
He will also be a lot stronger, physically, than you are—and then what?
How will you control him during his seizures?
How will you prevent him from running into the street?
He will also be a lot stronger, physically, than you are—and then what?
How will you control him during his seizures?
How will you prevent him from running into the street?
“ … I already know that it will be especially hard on me when his voice changes.”
And in another letter you almost casually mentioned that his voice is the most beautiful part of him.
And in another letter you almost casually mentioned that his voice is the most beautiful part of him.
(I put these two sentences together only just now.)
Just a small thought: a pint-sized dime-store philosophical thought.
Perhaps, in that moment, in my fantasy of pupils rubbing together—the tears that burst out will be completely different from those familiar to regular users.
I mean—maybe those tears will be sweeter than honey—they will drip drop drip and drip from some reservoir of hidden tear ducts that we never knew of—the sole bodily organ created in the knowledge that there will never be any use for it, throughout the entirety of life.
God’s sad, private joke—because He knew ahead of time just whom He was dealing with.
Because you may overcome gravity, but you can never overcome the repulsion, the rejection from a soul suddenly finding itself in front of another soul that’s gaping open—and immediately blinking—the blink, an instinctive border patrol.
I mean—maybe those tears will be sweeter than honey—they will drip drop drip and drip from some reservoir of hidden tear ducts that we never knew of—the sole bodily organ created in the knowledge that there will never be any use for it, throughout the entirety of life.
God’s sad, private joke—because He knew ahead of time just whom He was dealing with.
Because you may overcome gravity, but you can never overcome the repulsion, the rejection from a soul suddenly finding itself in front of another soul that’s gaping open—and immediately blinking—the blink, an instinctive border patrol.
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