BY ITSUSHI KAWASE
Yes, this is a story that I will tell only you.
I will share it with you if you promise not to tell anyone else.
It is a tale from ancient times. From before even God was born. When the minuscule seeds of mythologies were still frolicking a free. The egg of the universe, the seedling of life, was being raised by one Dove. An enormous, white dove. The dove swaddled the egg in its thick wings and raised it patiently over countless months and years.
One morning, the dove sensed that its death was near, so it fallen down on its side. When all that was left to do was waiting for its body to decay, suddenly, a girl with the face of a lion appeared, and she began to slowly play her harp.
Guided by her melody, the dove mustered its last bit of strength to open its wings, which were wet and more heavy than usual. With the spreading of its wings, the dying dove released a seductive, yet elegant fragrance into its surroundings. With the elegant fragrance, the seedlings of life took off to begin their journeys. How glorious that moment was! From the six breasts on the forewings of the dove, tears, like red wine, fell. The spot where the tears dropped became a spring of red nectar. The elegant aroma of the corpse of the dove and the sweet smell of the nectar melded together, and spread through the surrounding space. One of the seedlings of life became a ladybug and came near, invited by the indescribable smell.
Nay, perhaps more appropriate to say it returned. The ladybug peered into the universe beyond the spring, as if that was the natural thing to do. The girl with the lion face said this: That is the uterus of nothingness. If you stare into the abyss of nothingness, your own soul will become pitch black, too. From there, troublesome myths will be born, like history, religion and economics… Then, they will circulate as they wish, out of control.
For the ladybug, however, the red nectar was too sweet and too seductive to listen seriously to the girl with the lion face. The ladybug believed that, by drinking the nectar, its body could release its own sweet scent, sparkle, and have a significant presence. With the help of its friend, the caterpillar, the ladybug bailed nectar out of the spring for three days and three nights. That nectar became a grand river and flowed out everywhere. The flow branched into countless streams (one of which, the Milky Way, you certainly know) and spread like capillaries, and eventually began to pulse. With each pulse, the world became enveloped with rainbow scales. One day, the caterpillar suddenly found the ladybug comical, diligently digging at the nectar, and pushed the ladybug into the spring. Perhaps it was the devil at work.
The caterpillar then covered the spring with ice, trapping the ladybug inside. Oh my, oh my… The ladybug curled up and tumbled into the darkness. It shivered with fear and screamed and cried, but managed to crawl back up to the top of the spring. It tried to get out, but the ice was too heavy to move
Then, a scorpion appeared, and told the ladybug that it should not open the lid, it should dig further down the spring.
When the ladybug dug as it was told, it found a vast, captivating, blue sky. A Nyala with countless legs, like a centipede, was walking steadfastly through the air. The Nyala march was not aimless, not random– it followed the infinite path carved into the sky by the tears from the moth’s breasts. The ladybug trusted Nyala’s systematic stride, and decided to follow it. Then, it encountered the girl with the lion face as she was playing her harp and trying to create angels. The newborn angels were shivering, afraid. I created you, now, listen to the sound of my harp and follow me, the girl with the lion face appeared to scream.
She would raise the angels on her private farm with many fences, and gradually build history. That was her grand plan. The ladybug was stunned to see the girl with the lion’s face act and speak so differently from before. It remained quiet and decided to watch the exchange from afar.
Some angels did not believe a word the girl said. Others could not tell if she was fibbing, and were puzzled. Then, one angel spoke to the girl with the lion face, with a worried expression: if you are really the creator, then make a human. The girl with the lion face said: easy. Then she proceeded to create a human body. The body, however, had no soul. The soul had fallen away. At last, the ladybug could not stand to just watch. It said to the angels: do not follow the sound of the harp of the girl with the lion face. Align your breath with the glimmer of the rainbow scales.
At the ladybug’s calm advice, the angels came to their senses. The girl with the lion face became red hot with rage, and the heat made the lion face peel off. The girl with the lion face was actually a single duck. The duck, as if nothing had happened, took off to search for the spring of red nectar.
The ladybug took the stunned angels and began collecting the scales that had not quite dried yet. It spread those scales across the world. The fragments of scales, as they were tossed about, glimmered and clink-clanked dryly. Those fragments became the seeds of mythologies, lived over many eras, and developed a pulse.
Those seeds are passed to troubadours who tell the tales, and they give birth to new myths that permeate through the whole world.
For Clara Spilliaert’s exhibition “Clara Sekirara”
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SUNDAY EDITION 24 JULY 2022
