And I got to know them, those who had not perished.
Those who had never been further from their island, Easter
Island , never left their island other than diving for sport, fare
or ritual. I had heard them also, as
one hears a whispering in the ear: the first night of my arrival, they would
not let me sleep?
The living inhabitants of the island, they were as if they had not yet
even seen cell phones. It was as if twilight itself had been frozen over that
little island that didn’t hardly even show on a map, that not even a hand full
of people out of all the whole world, lived, and more visitors came to visit
each week than lived on the island—two flights in and two flights out each
week. Without a doubt, no more than four platoons of civilians, looking out
into all directions and touching nothing for two-thousand miles but water:
never anything bigger, or big enough for a plane to land on—to be remembered.
Here was a place that banshees, and unfamiliar spirits, and the long
eared, red haired cyclopean spirits, from the bird cult, of the once and now
sunken empire of Lemuria come to live—breaking waves to reach this most
isolated island in the world ((from the
scattered islands of the South Pacific) (the spirits of the dead—even returning
as cockroaches and flies, coming back to kill but when they came back as crabs,
they didn’t kill—so legend says. They named Raraku after a mountain, they
guarded their spirits while they slept, lest they be taken from them; many
spirits haunted the crater of Rano Raraku, so tales are told)), here is where the spirits live, have lived,
and died, and still live, beyond
reproach, for countless centuries have lived—have lived in and on, and
seemingly forever, within the: stones, the streams round the coast in formed grottoes
and crannies, innumerable, once sleeping places, once burials, small chambers
with roofed slabs, cracks and crooks and
crevices of the island: walked at one time those ancient roads to and around and within the crater Rano Kao, Cooks Bay, Hanga Roa;
and somewhere along the unwritten line of ancient languages, built, carved and
erected those ancient colossus’ with designs and images showing raised rings
and girdle and with what: stone tools? Chipping away the stone in undermining
the statue —those excavated statues: at Rano Raraku carving out those stone red
hats in an unfinished quarry, where their hats were stamped, marked for
delivery: loved, whether they had
anything to be remembered for, or loved for, did love and live, but nothing
more than spirits of them remain: nothing other than those unmovable stone
colossus’ —those who would not perish, they are still there, inside those stone
colossus’ as if imprinted with their old spiritual residue way back when:
towering with weights up to ninety tons, without names that are now but shadows
of the deeds that made them now silent, men who did the deeds, who lasted and
now endure the stones and fought the battles and lost and won and fought again,
and again, and again, because they were not even aware they lost, but in time
overwhelmed by the world that surrounded them—remained, would not perish did
not perish, yet still went on to shape their island: reliving, and simply
living their old customs, traditions, as old as those statues, those huge
mammoth ancient statues.
I got to know them both—the living inhabitants and those who would not
perish, still powerful in their legends, still powerful and dangerous with one
another. The unfamiliar spirits hidden in those statues, in the bones under
those statues—they did visit me, talked to me, even a witch visited me, and
told me what they died for, what they became, just whispers of course, a few
words, no louder than a whispering sun-shower, or a murmuring sunflower to
another sunflower, even the marrow in their bones talked to me, and the skull
in the cave talked to me: we came to an understanding—them and I, that it was
Easter Island, and it is just a dot in the South Pacific, and yes, that’s so,
it’s all right—to live in stone, in the past, if that is what you want—a near
silent and lonely life, but if that is what you want, really and truly want.
Five days later in the late afternoon I flew out from under that island,
through the shade of those old glorious stone statues—and those who would not
perish, then along the ocean, turning to Santiago, Chile, leaving behind me the
old other world—that still is the old other world.
No: 487 (written, 10-5-2009; reedited, 11-1-2009;
reedited a second time, 2-24-2012; reedited a third time 8-2-2012)
No comments:
Post a Comment