By Shkëlqim ABAZI
Part thirty-six
S P A Ç
The Grave of the Living
Tirana, 2018
(My memories and those of others)
Memorie.al /Now in my old age, I feel obliged to tell my truth, just as I lived it. To speak of the modest men, who never boasted of their deeds and of others whose mouths the regime sealed, burying them in nameless pits? In no case do I presume to usurp the monopoly on truth or claim the laurels for an event where I was accidentally present, even though I desperately tried to help my friends, who tactfully and kindly deterred me: “Brother, open your eyes… don’t get involved… you only have two months and a little more left!” A worry that clung to me like an amulet, from the morning of May 21, 22, and 23, 1974, and even followed me in the months after, until I was released. Nevertheless, everything I saw and heard during those three days; I would not want to take to the grave.
Continued from the previous issue
“In those gorges where the sun and earth would kiss for no more than three hours, on May 21, ’73, the unique event in human history would unfold: the wretches defied the fiercest dictatorship ever known; the convicts demanded freedom for the ‘free,’ the slaves attempted to liberate heraldry from the communist ‘starry’ handcuffs, they sought democratic aspirations for the ‘democratic’ people and begged for rights for the wronged, they ignored themselves and nurtured hope!
Ordinary individuals were transformed into GiANTS (ANT-e), while the ‘Zeuses’ got scared and poured out the arsenal of Marxist blasphemies, unleashed hordes of brainwashed mongrels, catapulted spies, thugs, guards, police in uniform and out of uniform, soldiers armed to the teeth…!
Oh God, in the retro sequences of those three days, the living and the dead are confounded, the executed of the revolt converse with those who would be lost in the crevices of the era of terror…? Victim, victim, victim…, shackled Prometheuses and much blood!
Fresh, clotted, black, mixed with chips of brain and shorn tufts of hair! Scattered everywhere: in the entrances of the tunnels, on the copper and pyrite fronts, on the rails corroded by acid, in the shattered beds of the wagons, in the dirty dormitories full of lice and bedbugs, on the floor trampled by thousands of feet, on the sharp points of the surrounding wires.
Everywhere cracked heads, shattered brains, clotted blood, broken bones, torn scalps, police with blackthorn clubs, convicts tied with German handcuffs, cells packed tight with battered bodies, sniffer dogs ready to tear anyone they met face-to-face… and Prometheuses tied to the rock, whose livers were being gnawed by the eagles of Zeus! Defeated, but undefeated Titans!
…and the baby David, who was growing up to strike down Goliath!
The Post-Revolt Panorama:
…A tableau of horror worthy of the brush of the painter of Guernica! For over four decades, the dreams did not leave me… even after the dictatorship fell! While in the waking state, the sensations change: I meet old friends and refresh my memory, the tongue goes where the tooth hurts, and the conversation naturally slips into the topic that is never exhausted.
We remember the departed and the past episodes that are etched in our memory as if they happened yesterday; we reconstruct the unrepeatable events and the poignant moments, we evoke the elite men who did no outstanding heroism for mythology, but proved themselves worthy of history.
Perhaps we exaggerate a little, but the mountain is given its real dimensions when seen from a distance, and the weather when the sky clears and the mirage dissipates, the gaze penetrates deeper into the horizon. When the blood cools and the anger subsides, reason becomes clearer, and thus one judges and analyzes without passion.
III
Sleep had overcome me with my head resting on the table. Age and illness are wearing me down. Perhaps as the sun sets, the rays gloom the horizon and fade the colors, distorting the figures, giving them more gigantic dimensions. Now that we are on the threshold of two worlds, this one here, where we cling with our claws because the unknown eternity frightens us, and the other that beckons us, but frightens us with its mystery.
“Oh Omnipresent God, ease our end,” we pray to the Great One, although those who stoned him pray this way too.
“As misfortune comes, often the worshipers meet a painful end, while the revilers pass without troubles!”
“Sh-shh! Don’t blaspheme!”
“I have blindly believed in you, oh God!”
“What’s wrong with you now?”
“In any case, I believe in inalienable justice!”
“Amen!” Zhërr-rr the bell rings.
The dream dissolved, I touched reality. “Hello!” – a familiar voice.
“Good evening!”
“Good evening, how are you?” – Very familiar.
“Fine, thank you for the call!” I replied mechanically.
“Yes, old friends are remembered!”
“You are right, I have been trying to connect with them for a long time, but I haven’t been able to!”
“I am Fitim Veizi from Vlora, I wanted to ask you about a problem?”
“Speak, Fitim!”
“There is talk that the chief of the Kuçova commissariat will be moving…?”
“It hasn’t become a fact yet, perhaps he will leave!”
“Who could know better than you?”
“I can’t tell you more for today!”
“Alright, will something be done for me if it happens?”
“Of course, I will support you fully!”
“I don’t doubt it! Anyway, thank you! Good night!”
“Fitim, I wanted to ask about a friend from Vlora; it’s almost a year since I last heard from him on the phone!”
“Who might that be?”
“Namik Zeneli from Vajza…”
“Yesterday we commemorated the first anniversary of his death…”
“What did you say?!”
“Yes, it’s been a year…”
“Are you confusing him with someone else, Fitim?!”
“He was my aunt’s husband…”
“No way, what did you tell me!”
“It’s true; they died one year after the other!”
“That’s too bad!”
“They left no heir either!… Good night!”
“Good night… you shattered me!”
“For a year now, this disaster happened, and I keep calling the phone as always! Oh devil, did he take the phone with him to heaven?! Why did no one think to pick it up, after all, it wasn’t only theirs, but ours too, who spent years in the ordeal of prisons?!”
“Oh God, why do you make no distinction, taking the good and the bad! At least, you should somehow divide them into the useful and the ordinary! I’m not saying we should wither on earth, as that would be a scandal and would shock the world! But first the ordinary ones, because even the laying hen is separated from the others! Namik had much to do, his work could only be done by him, and ours can be done by anyone!”
IV
I overcame the illness and set out to visit where he rested. Perhaps I would be comforted by the fact that he had an easy passing, as he had expressed to me: “May God bring it to us softly, softly, like the snow of the night, and lightly, lightly, like the goose feather! You see the snow has fallen in the morning, and when you let go of the feather, you feel you have grasped it!” He left without a sound, without fanfare, without the posturing of the arrogant, abandoned by humanity but surrounded by books. With a white bouquet, as pure as his soul, I stepped into the cemetery, where I didn’t need to call the phone or listen to the rambling of the computer’s icy voice.
The gentle timbre of my friend descended from the ether where he had flown, crossed the atmosphere, and penetrated the earth where his bones, mutilated by the handcuffs of the dictatorship, rested. From above the coffin, he looked at me, smiling, while his voice broke, just as it had when I consoled him for the loss of his wife: “My esteemed friend, God punished me with loneliness, humanity with a lack of love, history with oblivion, but the book has not abandoned me yet…”
“Nor have we, your friends!” I completed his thought.
“Anyway, life follows its own course!”
“Normal!” I affirmed.
“Troubles separated us; everyone has their own.”
“But it united us on one front of ideal!” I emphasized with the conviction that I was easing his worries.
“One day, we will all leave this world.”
“Only we cannot choose the manner of leaving.”
“Naturally, after the departure, traces will remain.”
“But we won’t leave the same ones!” I stressed, to remind him that his life had been worthwhile, no matter how miserable.
“That is an individual choice!”
“I think it is a matter of personality,” I affirmed with the conviction that I had said something non-negotiable.
“Even though you cannot separate them from each other, the moment of the final farewell arrives!” He fell silent as a reproach.
“Brother, we should have been there for you!”
“Thank you! I felt you close, every hour and minute, in pain and joy, if not physically, at least spiritually.” His innocent smile and joy cleared your mind and prompted you to talk endlessly. I virtually opened my heart to my friend, without the intrusions of the icy computer voice with the macabre news: “Hello! The A.M.C. number you are req… Does not exist. Thank you…”!
“Hush, you’re killing me, damn it!”
“What’s wrong, my friend?”
“This siren voice has been shrieking in my ears for a year: Namik does not exist, it says!”
“Well, here we are face-to-face!” His lips moved over the marble.
“Of course!”
“We have been this way all the time…”
“That’s what I say too!”
“Today more than ever!”
“How? Where?”
“In the Elysian Fields, near the Great God!”
“Do you have any regrets, Namik?”
“Naturally, I left with worries like every mortal, without property, without a house, without belongings, without heirs, withered, wrinkled, shrunken…”
“No, not without legacy; I believe you have done much to be remembered.”
“And who will remember us after this? Even those who spoke in our name abandoned us!”
“They are overwhelmed by their troubles.”
“We didn’t ask for a corner; we deserved a little respect and compassion.”
“We haven’t lacked it!”
“Oblivion has covered us, like that book you flip through for a long time and then throw away to be covered by a rag.”
“Nevertheless, the ancient book and old wine never lose their value; the more they age, the more precious they become,” I philosophized.
“Let’s hope so!” The words dried up.
I was overwhelmed by the microscopic weight and was trapped within the wall of that cemetery, where oceans, continents, seas, mountains, plains, rivers, states, and macro-states, towns, and cities intertwined; while the surrounding cypresses turned into nets of barbed wire, just like the political prison’s enclosure… in my memories, as the universe gained dimension.
Oh God, the coldness of the monolith contrasted with the kindness of the portrait. The sensation of two worlds, separated by a rocky border, took over my mind: “One day, I too will end up under such a block, with a name carved in stone and a photo with a static smile, to remind the living of the horrors of the wild dictatorship we endured.
Ah, what a life, little brother; the unrealized dreams bent our backs like the stone of Sisyphus, the unfulfilled aspirations and dozens of exiled ideas tortured us and didn’t leave us a second of peace. Now they will huddle under this stone, even if it is polished marble, it could have been flint that throws sparks, and the exhausted body will stretch out long and wide, in the limited cubic space of the coffin; perhaps the broken bones will be quieted, but the spirit will rebel, leave the remains underground, and sail into the boundless space!”
When I raised my head, my friend looked at me mockingly.
“You’ve fallen into deep thoughts?” the voice thundered from the Zenith.
“What a worthless world!”
“Not as much as you think!”
“Is it worth it, you think?”
“Until the very last minute!”
“And after that?”
“Eternity awaits!”
“How do you feel there?” I asked to change the subject.
“I won eternity; I am at peace with myself and with God…”
“I wish you a pleasant eternity!”
“And I wish you happiness and a long life, above earthly transience; when you come here, we will know how to welcome you!” The tone faded as the grave shook from a deep seismic tremor.
“Goodbye, my friend.”
We hadn’t talked this long in a while. I walked away, head bowed, with tears in my eyes…!
During the return, I was followed by the sighs of the one who never complained while alive and was now complaining when dead:
“Our life withered away, young in prisons and internment; many left their bones in the cemetery of Albania, and freedom was not their fate.”
“We, the living, have the duty to give you the rest you were denied, the happiness lost in the abyss, to offer you a grave where family members can lay a bouquet of flowers!” I cut short his hallucinatory lecture.
“More than twenty years ago, we were clear-headed and knew the limit; we knew the friends, the comrades, the well-wishers, but also the enemies, the surveillants, the spies, the investigators, and the prosecutors, the whole lot of our adversaries…! But now…?”
“Oh well, the waters flowed, the events were forgotten, and the people moved on! They didn’t even open the files for the people to be at peace!”
“From whom are you expecting it? From those who filled them tight with ‘What Ifs’?” A sigh escaped me involuntarily.
“Maybe they are waiting for us, the few remaining witnesses, to also be gone! Time flows, people age and die, and the veil of oblivion will cover everything.”
“Yes, over twenty years have passed…”
“For the life of an individual, that is a lot; those born in the nineties became men, the twenty-year-olds of the past are fathers, the forty-year-olds are grandfathers, the sixty-year-olds are eighty, and most are in the cemeteries.”
“That’s how life is, my friend!”
“On the other hand, for the history of a nation, it is very little; the dialectic of development is not measured in years, but in epochs, decades, centuries, and millennia. The tomorrow of a person is separated by a night; the tomorrows of the nation are measured in centuries…”
I don’t know how long the virtual conversation would have lasted, had a sudden brake not jolted me. “We’ve arrived, sir! This is not a hotel for sleeping…” the driver’s voice said.
I climbed the alley, shaken in body and mind…! Nevertheless, from now on, I know where my friend is; I won’t waste time with the intrusions and the macabre notification of the computer’s icy voice: “Hello! The A.M.C. number you are req… Does not exist. Thank you…”!
In the Pyrite Holes
(Where the snow was flaming black)
Cataclysm of Dreams!
A black sleep, with pitch-dark dreams, seized me and plunged me into the confusing world, almost into chaos. The black panorama unfolded on the canvas, as black as the landscape across from me.
Black was the river with black waters, black the banks with the pitch-dark valley, black the forest with dark trees, black mountains and ridges with brownish snow. The shepherdess across the river was black; black the sheep, blacker the grass they grazed. The palette was pitch-dark, the brushes blackened, the tubes blackened: Squeeze one, it’s black, squeeze the next, it’s black, and the next, and the next, all pitch-dark. Oh God, what a futuristic painting, black all over!
“Black and blacker, may your light be extinguished!”
“Why did you pick a fight with me?”
“We will bury you in the pitch-darkness of hell!”
“Why, why, why?”
“You have entered our domain!”
“Me?”
“You and the others!”
“Who are you who threaten so harshly? The Demons of Hades! Lord Demons, I didn’t know you were masters in Hades?”
“Oh well, there are many things you don’t know, you poor wretch!”
“Nevertheless, I apologize for trespassing on your territory, but I was brought here by force!”
“Words, my lord, words! Where have I heard that?”
“Does it matter? Shakespeare said it once, but we will repeat it because you came here and you will become like us!”
“The communists left me no other choice!”
“We don’t have them as allies for nothing!”
“Your allies!?”
I looked up, but the sky was pitch-dark and enraged, without light, without moon, without stars. “We will blacken you, we will darken you!”
“What is this malice?”
“You occupied our property!”
“Oh God, what property are you talking about?”
“The pyrite holes!”
“And you, who are you?”
“Cerberus!”
“Cerberus!? I knew you as a guard in Hades?”
“Well, we changed position; the communists took Hades, they left us these holes!”
“May you have luck with them, I don’t envy you!”
“We exchanged them ourselves! What were you looking for here?”
“I didn’t come willingly; I was brought by force!”
“It changes nothing; we will blind you just the same!”
“You are wrong; we are the victims of the class struggle!”
“You are Oedipuses, children of incest!”
“I don’t accept that! I have biological parents, mother and father!” I protested.
“Oedipus also had a mother, but he made her his wife!”
“That is a unique case, like our communists!”
“You are the spawn of the incestuous system!”
“That’s right, but the communists!”
“You all wander in that circle; you blackened ones, that’s why you roam in the endless night!”
“Is it night?”
“It is always night here!”
“I don’t covet your night! I hate the darkness, I want the sun, I like the light!”
“Who doesn’t like it? But you are condemned to live in the night without day, you wretched generations!”
“Help us, oh God!”
“Forget it; God helps those who help themselves!”
“Who can I turn to?”
“The communists!”
“We are adversaries!”
“Who cares? We look at our kingdom!”
Immediately the sky tore open, and a deep, black chasm, like the mouth of a funnel, was projected into the infinite. In the nadir of the crater, an unseen sun shone with scaly rays.
It felt like I was navigating the black interplanetary orbits.
“Oh God, keep me sane!”
“You drove God away, now you ask for him!”
“I didn’t drive him away!”
“What difference does it make, you approved it!”
“On the contrary, I suffered for it!”
“Your peers destroyed the temples and desecrated every shrine.”
“But what fault is mine?”
“For all, all for one, you fool!”
“That’s a communist slogan!”
“You all graze in that pasture, don’t you?”
The pitch-dark cloud, like the lonely fog that darkens the ridges and dissipates with the first breeze, concealed the black rays of the tar-black sun, laden with rumbling and croaking sounds, similar to the blackness.
Darkness all around!
“What is this pitch-dark fog?”
“Krra-u, krro-krro, krra-u,” a flapping of wings shook the atmosphere, and the cloud sailed with a roar: “Krra-u, krro-krro, krra-u.”
“We will pluck out your eyes like plums!- krra-u, krro-krro, krra-a-a-u.”
“Who are you?”
“The Ravens of Hell!”
“May your journey be good, Mr. Ravens!”
“This is where we have our nest!- krrau- krro-krro-krra-a-a-u.” / Memorie.al
To be continued in the next issue
