Thoreau Bound, page 54
“Kalimera, Kosmos,” he said politely. “My job is to ask you to stop this nonsense. Unlock your handcuffs. Come with me to have a good breakfast.”
“Good morning, Enthradis,” Kosmos replied. “I must decline your generosity. My job is to protect the places and the people I love.”
“What you cannot stop by law,” said the glib man, “you should not attempt to stop by lawlessness.”
Kosmos shook his head.
“There is a truthful fairy tale, my friend, that ends with this moral: Laws are devised by the rich to protect and increase their wealth and power.”
“And you insist,” said the wily contractor, “that grown men should be reading fairy tales?”
“We should read fairy tales,” Kosmos replied, “until we are old enough and wise enough to share our power and our wealth.”
“You should study the myths instead,” said Enthradis, “and learn the fate of fools who imitate Prometheus.”
The contractor waved his hand and three workers entered the café, the smallest one as tall and broad-shouldered as Rakis, and the biggest one at least one head taller than Kosmos’s devoted friend. Rakis threw down his file and stood up, ready to fight them all.
“Rakis,” said Kosmos, “do you want to help me, or do you want to hurt me so deeply that I will never be able to recover from the hurt? If you want to help me then remember our discussion about non-violence.”
Rakis looked at Kosmos, recalled that dialogue, and then placed his hands behind his back. One of the workers, a plumber, climbed onto the fountain, then inserted his plumber’s snake into the male organ of Cupid. When the plumber withdrew that long metal wire, the contractor waved his hands, and the three workers followed him out the café’s door. A minute later, as Rakis and I continued filing to set the rebel free, a gush of water spouted, pouring down ceaselessly on the heads of Kosmos, Rakis, and me. It was water surely, yet it felt like runny mud and smelled like rotten eggs.
“It’s funny, isn’t it Thoreau?” said Kosmos. “An hour ago I lived in a paradise, naked and carefree, amidst lovely women and zany men. Now, for doing what my heart says is right, I will be arrested for civil disobedience. These villagers are like the sheep who thank their slaughterers! The same people who would not budge one centimeter when I rang the bells to warn them to save themselves, now gather outside in droves to watch me fall from grace.”
He reached behind him and stroked the goddess’s cold breast.
“I am united with Aphrodite, but I can’t get any pleasure out of that because I am facing in the wrong direction. And to heap shame on the head of a man who already has troubles up to his neck, she delivers a liquid message from her son. Not showers of love and love’s great happiness! Foul-smelling water sprays us from the penile organ of the god of Love.”
For a few moments we enjoyed a lull from the ear-splitting clamor made by the stone-breaking machines. Kosmos seized that opportunity to shout to the crowd outside the café.
“Will Greece be an independent nation?” he yelled. “Or will we be a playground for the mindless rich? ... For three-thousand years the Greeks have fought for freedom. We survived the sieges of the Persians, the Romans, the Venetians, and the Turks. Yet the last invading armies may conquer us, since we welcome them with open legs and arms: the tourists!”
He placed his free hand on my arm.
“The human animal,” said Kosmos, “is made to sing, to dance, to love. My father knows as much about this joy as anyone alive. But we need defiance, too, to save these sacred things. That’s the one lesson my father can learn from me.”
Sirens screamed in the distance, growing louder and closer, making me wonder if those sirens blared from a police wagon, a fire truck, or an ambulance. Kosmos laughed and squeezed my arm.
“Thoreau, don’t you think that there must be a more effective way to save our global civilization from the injustices of big-corporation greed?”
“Kosmos,” I said. “This isn’t working at all. You’ll be in jail and the town will be flattened anyway. There must be a better way.”
We heard the loud crashes of nearby buildings getting knocked down to rubble and dust. The voyeuring villagers screamed — the huge claw of a steam shovel had just smashed through a window of our café. The café’s lights dimmed, the floor trembled, and all the while reeking water from the marble Cupid streamed down on the head and shoulders of Kosmos. The fearless man closed his eyes.
“We need so little to be happy,” he said. “Euripides, our rebellious playwright, wrote his ninety plays in a book-lined cave beside the sea. Think about the life inside these words, Thoreau.”
Still, with his eyes closed, Kosmos sang:
“To be alive, to see the light!
That alone is beautiful.
To see the light, and to see the new grass leaves
Or the grizzly faces of the stones.”
Another loud crash knocked out a wall of the Café Lathera.
“Kosmos,” I said. “Unlock yourself. It’s time to go. There are better battles to fight.”
The hand of Kosmos squeezed my arm.
“Don’t say anything more, Thoreau,” he said. “Not one word! Did you know that our ancient Greek ancestors believed that the human heart is as fragile as a Spring flower? They were so full of kindness and respect for life, that they could not let their dramas show acts of cruelty or violence. They told about them — never did they hide the truth! But these Greeks believed that the hardest events in life — the tragic moments when good men and women get no justice from the gods — should be always imagined and never seen.”
61
What Happened on the Boat at Agios Nikolodeonos
Two sea gulls, scavenging for scraps of food, circled above the head of Mother Whackanzakis, then landed awkwardly onto the deck of the boat. When my story ended, the Mother-nun picked up the sides of her frock — to keep its bottom from getting dirty — then marched to the boat’s assistant captain. Waving her hands, she complained loudly about the boat’s delay, and demanded information about the future that could not be known.
Out of the Mother’s sight, near the back of the boat where the lifeboats rested, Panzano and Dolcezza were standing together talking, the young man as nervous as a cube of gelatin, the young woman cool as an Italian ice.
“That necklace you’re wearing,” Panzano said anxiously, “is made of painted black-eyed peas: the Greeks call them ‘gypsy beans’. Is that a gift from an admirer?”
“No, silly,” answered Dolcezza. “Peas I have many, admirers none. At the nunnery we make jewelry and other trinkets, and we sell them to raise money for food and books. We sell IBCs, too. Do you know your IBCs?”
“You have one admirer,” Panzano said. “One who knows his ILUs, but never heard of the IBCs.”
Dolcezza reached into her pocket then smiled.
“Illuminated Bingo Cards,” she said. “We cut the cards, then decorate them with drawings of scenes from the Queen Jane Bible, and legends of sinners and saints. Here, look at this.”
Panzano examined a bingo card showing twenty-five numbered squares, adorned around the edges with colorful pictures of nuns, monks, candles, bells, wildflowers, and books. He praised the designs and the designer, then bought the card by handing Dolcezza all the money that the boat’s passengers had tossed into the hat for him.
“No, that’s much too much to give me for one card,” said the happy Dolcezza. “You can pay me one Euro, and here is your change.”
“Thank you,” said Panzano, as he placed the card back into her hand. “In love, just like in those old stories about paradise, all possessions belong to everyone. There is no difference between ‘Thine’ and ‘Mine’. I take this card which belongs to me, and I give it as a gift to you. And now, since it is yours again, I will buy it from you for the one Euro you’ll let me pay.”
Dolcezza laughed as Panzano — many times — bought the card, gave it to her as a gift, and then bought the card again. They played this game until all Panzano’s money had been transferred to the pockets of his favorite nun.
“Dolcezza,” Panzano murmured. “The first time I looked at you my heart flew away with my head. Come sei bella! How beautiful you are! Ti penso sempre! I always think of you!”
A siren sounded from somewhere in the town. Dolcezza glanced at the paved sidewalk near the dock, then looked into Panzano’s face and smiled.
“Close your eyes, Panzano,” she said. “Close your eyes and open your hands.”
Panzano obeyed, and soon felt his cheek blessed with the softest kiss. When he opened his eyes Dolcezza had vanished. His cheek tingled, and his left hand held a note that said:
“When this boat leaves, Oh, tell me when?
Then I shall kiss you once again.”
As he ran to find her he collided chest to chest with the nun named Forza, who said to Panzano “Excuse me, sir”, to which he replied, “My pleasure.”
The distant siren blared a bit louder as the ship’s assistant captain stood up on the wood crate he had placed in the center of the boat’s deck. He had loosened his collar and removed his tie; he had forgotten to shave the beard-stubble dotting his cheeks and chin. Minutes after he’d raised his left hand, the chattering passengers ceased their gabbing and then swiveled their heads to hear the latest report.
“Our boat,” he said in a tired voice, “is not yet ready to depart.”
Mother Whackanzakis looked innocent as an angel whose heaven was a third helping of dessert. In her white-blue dress bulging with layers of flab, she sprang up and shouted at the harried first mate. Her voice sounded ever-so anxious for the boat to leave.
“Dark messenger,” said Mother-nun, “who brings us news that always sounds the same. Tell us what the problem is.”
With a shrug of his shoulders, the assistant captain removed his Cretan cap. Mother Whackanzakis now spoke to the impatient passengers.
“Greece charms us for four reasons,” she began. “Its passionate people; its sublime sunshine and light; its incomparable food; and its humanizing inefficiency. It all started aeons ago. When the goddess Gaea decided to divide the world into countries, she first ripped up a thick layer of the Earth — as easily as you would pull off an orange peel — and then dropped this into a gigantic sieve. She shook the sieve and sprinkled some of the good soil all around the globe. Then she looked into the bottom of the sieve and saw that it was filled with rocks. She threw these rocks over her shoulder, and the country where the rocks landed she named Greece. ... And then — ”
Waving his arms, Panzano jumped between the speaker and her audience. Dolcezza’s note had excited him so greatly, that at first he babbled in Italian and forgot to translate into the Inglese that everyone grasped.
“Gallina che schiamazza non fa uova. La verità è senza varietà. Le parole non empiono il corpo. Il ventre non si sazia di parole. Dal detto al fatto c’è un gran tratto. Altro è promettere, altro è mantenere. Il primo scudo è il più difficile a fare. Barba bagnata è mezza fatta!”
When the assistant captain appeared dumbfounded, and the audience laughed and laughed, Panzano rendered his ideas into English crystalline.
“You cackle often, but never lay an egg. Truth needs not many words. Fine words butter no parsnips. Fair words fill not the belly. From words to deeds is a great space. It is one thing to promise and another to perform. The first step is the only difficulty. A good lather is half the shave!”
This strange sausage of sayings was snipped by Mother Whackanzakis, who grabbed Panzano’s earlobe, then pulled him to a place where they could not be overheard.
“Panzano,” she said, still tugging him by the ear. “If you make yourself as sweet as honey, then the flies will eat you up. Give me time enough and I could make you understand: Il mondo è di chi se lo piglia. The world belongs to the man who is bold!”
Sirens blared louder and closer to the boat. Mother Whackanzakis, after releasing the captive earlobe, quickly found three of her nuns, who began to sing a fragment from the vagabond melody by Sarasate, called Zigeunerweisen. The poignant song attracted the remainder of the nuns, who clapped hands and stomped feet un-nunlikely as they sang it to the end. Singing completed, the eleven nuns huddled in circle to listen while Mother-nun talked.
The boat’s crew handed out cold drinks and desserts, and the crowd gathered around me with smiling faces and curious eyes.
“What happened,” shouted a young woman, “after you escaped unscathed in Agia Souvlakis from the Cooked-in-oil Café?”
I heard the question, I looked at the eager audience, yet I did not respond. The sirens were blaring louder and closer, and my sharp ears attempted to distinguish whether these screams were arriving to take prisoners or to give aid. The way the sea-foam taunted the sandy shore, a dazzling new idea teased the edges of my funconscious mind. As always, when my inner life caught fire, the world around seemed dull and lifeless as a faded photograph.
Recognizing my fit of concentration, seeing that I was in no mood to talk, Panzano stepped up beside me and sat me down on a wooden crate. He placed his finger on the cheek graced by Dolcezza’s kiss; he took a deep breath and then looked up at the crowd.
“I can tell you the rest of Thoreau’s story,” he said. “After the accident of Kosmos in the café, Thoreau wandered for three weeks, looking for the tribe of gypsy women. Not for his own selfish pleasures, I swear it! — he wanted to give them money to escape to a new life. He searched all over Crete, looking for patteran — the Gypsy train — the grass, leaves, and branches that gypsies leave to show their companions the road they’ve traveled on.”
Panzano glanced at the smiling Dolcezza, then told more.
“Alas, a lass! the isle of Crete has more than two-thousand caves! When Thoreau realized that he could not find the wild women, he returned to his place on the beach at Agios Nikolodeonos. Here he met me, Panzano — a paunch filled with a pinch of proverbs and a penchant for foolishness — after I had just been robbed by a horde of gypsies, on my first day in Crete. Thoreau had a night then a fight with a blonde beauty named Bliss, a fearless feminist who insisted on traveling around the world alone. This broke his heart because just as he failed to get the gypsy women safely off this island, he failed to keep his Bliss on Crete. Two unscrupulous angels found him as he slept like a mummy on the sand, his spirit wounded and his body tuckered out. And as the two women forced their pleasures on this sleeping prince, it has never been more true that ‘Bacio di bocca, spesso cuor non tocca’ — which is to say, ‘A kiss on the lips often does not reach the heart.’ ... I, Panzano, resisted like a hero, but the two angels overpowered me by guile, then burned Thoreau’s precious books and our cheap clothes. When Thoreau woke up he realized that by farce or force he should have stopped Bliss from her too-dangerous travel plans. So Thoreau wrapped up our dangling parts in glowing-yellow duct tape, which made him look like a laughter-loving god, and me like a three-hundred pound baby duck. Thoreau felt discouraged, on the morning of this first April day, but when the boat’s whistle called, I cheered him up and urged him to seek adventures by running to catch this unsinkable ship.”
Panzano placed his hands on his hips then laughed.
“And you see, it was not my courage alone, but my courage along with Thoreau’s ingenuity that saved us! Thoreau had hidden our most valuable possessions under a rock so heavy that only the strongest men could make it move. Otherwise, I would have lost my passport — ”
Panzano held up an empty piece of plastic that once contained the important little booklet. When he noticed that nothing sat inside it, he reached into a slit in his duct tape, then looked down at the deck, then cringed with horror at the fact that it was gone.
“My passport is missing!” he shouted.
“And my watch is stolen!” yelled the boat’s assistant captain.
Other passengers cried out: “My jewelry! My wallet! My cash!”
Two police cars stopped with a screech on the concrete dock, then ten officers — the cream of the Tourist Police — hurriedly boarded the boat. The captain’s assistant raised his hand.
“Carry on with your activities,” he announced, “but do not leave the boat. The police will be searching the possessions of all the passengers. We apologize for any incontinence that this might cause.”
Policemen mixed into the crowd to question and examine every passenger. As I watched this calm procedure, the tall nun named Donnabella tossed two blankets to me — “So this evening when the sun dies, you and your friend will not be cold,” she said. Mother-nun clapped her hands, and then led her other ten nuns in a dance known as the zalangos. Donnabella, noticing how my eyes wondered at the dance, touched my arm then said: “The dance tells the story of the young women in the town of Suli, who chose to die rather than to live as slaves. In the dance, one at a time, a woman will separate herself from the circle of dancers. This reminds us of the women of Suli, who — to avoid being captured by Turkish invaders — one after another leaped over the steep cliffs of Zalongo with their children in their arms.”
The nun named Forza grabbed the hand of Donnabella to bring her to the dance. But the chief of the police officers stopped her, then asked to look inside the blue-wool stocking she had knitted hours ago. Forza tossed the stocking to another nun, who tossed it to another, and at last the stocking flew into the chaste hands of Dolcezza.
A policeman snatched the stocking from her, reached inside, and then — to the gasps and shouts of the boat’s passengers — pulled out then held up the assistant captain’s wristwatch. The chief of police made a call on his phone, and then the remaining officers surrounded the friendless nuns.
Panzano’s astounded face looked as white as the nun’s robes. From the depths of his soul he cried out:
“O occhi miee, occhi non già ma fonti! ... Oh eyes of mine, not eyes but fountains now!”
