[ Ego, Orpheus, dum ad ripas
fluminis nigri tibia cano, ad amatam meam reditum somniavi.]
Even when she was painting, Shanaya’s thoughts
unknowingly wandered to Orpheus, as if she was charmed by the crescent moon. The
woman painted of lunatic shadows, of hearsay, and of bygone pebbles in the dark
waters of the black river. She wanted to paint the moonlight on the river, but
was unsure if the river would welcome her. Even so, Shanaya sought the dusk in
no uncertain terms, as she wanted to separate her lover from his darkness.
She instinctively realized that the dark river
was born of the revenge of Vice, encircling Orpheus like a terrible curse. The
thoughts of Orpheus’ lifeless body floating in the river alarmed her, and she
could never bring herself to paint this vision. Instead, she concealed her
tears in shades of the sleepy dawn, of seeing him walking alone by the shore, far
and far into the realms of the underworld.
Although his flute comforted her with an immortal
melody, she secretly worried that their destinies would never cross paths and one
day Orpheus would forget everything she whispered to him. However, every time
she thought of such ominous endings, she could visualize a dead body floating
downstream, whose face may look like that of Orpheus, but was nothing like him.
In her fever, she wondered if this vision was a sign, a mournful story that the
forbidden forest wanted her to listen to.
It was as if his music was an unbearable loss
for the dead, even more for the river herself. She would paint the river assuming the form of a black snake, coldly encircling the body for a last kiss. Shanaya
herself was never so close to death, and to eternal life, except for her love
for Orpheus. In her soliloquies, she often wished that she would ask him about
the endless tyranny of his flute, how the dead disappeared in the river
whenever she thought of being separated forever.
Thus was the reverie of the woman, as she
sought of death as her lover, even so smiling in her fancies, imagining playful
moments under the autumn sun.
Si est oblita parvis luna, si
privatus amore non caret vixit
Allicit somnis corpore, mihi
tempora oblivionis terrorem vicis sunt
Aquous mortuos assumit; tu rivos
amnis arcere consequeris
Tu amor, tu libertas; mihi est
mors
Absolvi vitia, absolvi me, evadi
in nihilum.
यदि क्षुद्रैः विस्मृता चन्द्रमा, यदि एकान्ती प्रेम्णा न हीनः—सः जीवितवान्।
एतत् स्वप्नैः शरीरं मोहयति; मम कृते
विस्मृतेः कालाः भाग्यस्य त्रासः सन्ति।
कृष्णनदी मृतान् गृह्णाति; त्वं नद्याः
प्रवाहान् रोद्धुं शक्नोषि।
त्वम् एव प्रेम, त्वम् एव मुक्तिः;
मम कृते मृत्युः अस्ति।
मया पापानि मुक्तानि, अहम् आत्मना
मुक्तः, अहं शून्यतायां लीनः।
