Chapter 6 Chapter Six

"Have you ever seen such a city?" Kublai Khan asked Marco Polo, pointing to the bridges over the canals, the water-soaked marble steps and the boats that unload baskets of vegetables at the market place, the balconies, the platforms, the domes, the bell towers, the green island gardens in the gray lake. The emperor was being attended by this foreign favorite in the old capital of the fallen dynasty, the newest jewel in the Khan's crown. "I have never seen it, King Khan," replied Marco, "I never thought there would be such a city." The Emperor tried to look into his eyes.The foreigner lowered his eyelids.All day, Kublai was silent.

After sunset, on the platform of the palace, Marco Polo reported to the monarch about his mission.As usual, the Khan listened with half-closed eyes, as was his habit before going to bed, until his first yawn signaled the chamberlain to turn on the lights and lead him to his chambers.But Kublai Khan seemed to be fighting against the tiredness with every inch of his heart today. "Talk about another city," he persisted. "...you left that place and rode for three days along the northeast and east-northeast winds..." Marco continued his report, listing many place names, customs and products.His experience can be said to be inexhaustible, but at this moment he has to give up.At daybreak he said, "Khan, I have told about all the cities I know."

"I still owe one." Marco Polo bowed his head. "Venice," Khan said.Marco smiled. "Do you think I've been talking about other cities?" The emperor was unmoved. "I've never heard you mention that name." Polo said: "Every time I describe a city, I am actually talking about Venice." "I ask about other cities because I want you to talk about them. I don't ask about Venice until I hear you about it." "In order to highlight the characteristics of other cities, I must first talk about the first city that is always reserved. For me, it is Venice." "Then, every travel story of yours should start from the starting point, and describe Venice truthfully, the whole Venice , should not hide anything you remember."

Shallow ripples appeared on the surface of the lake, and the reflection of the Song Dynasty Forbidden City split into shiny fragments like floating leaves. "Memory images disappear as soon as they are fixed by words," Poirot said. "Maybe I don't want to tell about Venice because I'm afraid of losing it. Maybe, when I tell about other cities, I'm already losing it bit by bit." trading city five The water city of Esmeralda is interwoven with a network of canals and a network of roads.From one point to any point, you can choose land or water: in Esmeralda, the shortest point between two points is not a straight line but a curve with many random branches, so it can be used by pedestrians. There are more than two routes to choose from, and if you like to alternate land and water, you have more options.

In this way, the residents of Esmeralda don't have to worry about walking the same road every day.Not only that: the distribution of routes is not limited to the same level, along the way up or down, there are flat ground for stopping, bow-shaped bridges, and overhead roads.The routes on different levels of each section change alternately, so that each resident can enjoy different scenery when going to the same destination.Even the most settled and peaceful life in Esmeralda was not dull. But a life of secrecy and adventure, here and there, is more strictly limited.Esmeralda's cats, thieves, and illegitimate lovers took the high and intermittent way, sometimes jumping from roofs to terraces, sometimes with acrobatic steps to get to the gutters in the eaves.In the dark sewers below swarms of rats mingled with schemers and smugglers: they peered out of burrows and drain spouts, they slid through tunnels and ditches, carrying slices of cheese, contraband, Barrels of gunpowder fled from nest to nest, using underground passages to traverse the city.

Esmeralda's map should have marked these routes in different colors - solid or liquid, light or dark.More difficult to mark on the map are the routes of swallows, which cut through the air on roofs, trace invisible parabolas with their immobile wings, rush forward to devour a mosquito, spiral upward, skim the top of the spire, and Every point of the air route dominates the entire city. The City and the Eye IV Once you arrive in Phyllis, you will admire the various bridges on the canal: curved, covered, plinthed, barge-supported, suspended, and carved railings.In addition, there are all kinds of street windows: taproot, Moorish, arched, pointed, inlaid with half-moon or rose-patterned frosted glass; there are also many kinds of materials for paving the streets: cobblestones, flagstones , gravel and white tiles.There are surprising sights here and there: a caper clump jutting out from the top of the fortress wall, statues of three queens on beams and pillars, an onion-shaped dome strung with three small onion spires. "Blessed are those who can see Phyllis every day and enjoy the city scenery," you said, and at the same time regretted that you had to leave this city that you hadn't seen enough.

In fact, the opposite is true, and you find yourself compelled to live in Phyllis for a while.Soon the color of the city before you fades away, the rosettes of the windows, the statues on the pillars, the domes of the houses.Like other residents of Phyllis, you walk through the winding streets, distinguishing places of light and shade, a door here, a flight of steps there, a bench where you can put down your basket, and you will be caught if you walk carelessly. A burrow to step into.The rest of the city is invisible.Phyllis is a space whose streets are the connecting lines between points in nothingness, the quickest route to a certain merchant's tent without passing through the window of a certain creditor.What your footsteps follow is not what the eye sees but what the mind sees, what is buried, what is obliterated.If you think one of the two arcades is more pleasant, it is because a woman in a embroidered wide-sleeved dress passed there thirty years ago, or because the sunlight reflected by this arcade at a certain moment makes you feel uncomfortable. Do you recall another arcade somewhere. .

Thousands of eyes look up at the window, the bridge, the capers, they may be looking at a blank sheet of paper.There are many cities like Phyllis. They hide from everyone's eyes, but they cannot hide from those who come unexpectedly. Cities and Names III For a long time I thought of Pyla as a fortified city on the slope of the bay, surrounded like a goblet, with tall windows and towers, and a square as deep as a well, with a well in the center of the square.I hadn't seen it then.It is one of many cities that I have never set foot in, and I imagine them only by their names: Eufelicia, Odell, Margara, Gaturia.Pila has its own place, different from every other city, and like every other city, it is unmistakable in the mind.

One day my itinerary led me to Pila.When I set foot on this land, I immediately forgot everything I imagined before, and Pila became what Pila is now; I believe I always knew that there was a winding coast below, and the sea was hidden behind the dunes. Invisible; the street is long and straight; there are a bunch of houses at intervals, not high, and there is an open space between the houses to store wood, and there is also a wood factory; the wind blows the leaves of the water pump.Since then, the name Pila has reminded me of this sight, this light, this humming, this air of yellow dust: it obviously cannot mean anything else.

I still have in my mind many cities I have never seen and will never see, with their names attached to a shape, or fragments or glimpses of imagined shapes: Gaturia, Odile, Ufférie Sia, Margara.The city that towers over the bay is still there, with a well hidden in its square, but I can no longer pronounce its name, nor can I remember how I could have given it a name that meant nothing at all. The City and the Dead II I have never been farther than Adelma.It was dusk when we landed.The sailor on the pier who took the mooring line looked very much like a man who had been in the army with me but had died.That's when the wholesale fish market opens.An old man was loading a basket of sea urchins onto a cart; I seemed to recognize him; as soon as I turned around, he had disappeared in an alley, but I knew he looked like an old fisherman I had seen in my childhood, today Impossible to be alive.A cold and fever patient curled up on the ground made me sad, his head was covered with a blanket: a few days before my father died, his eyes were as yellow as this man's, and his beard and stubble were as long as this man's.I looked away; I couldn't look anyone in the face anymore.

I thought: "If Adelma is a city seen in a dream, if you meet only the dead in this city, then it is indeed a frightening dream. If it is a real city, inhabited by living people , then I have only to go on looking at them, and the resemblance will always disappear, and faces with pained expressions will appear, and in any case I had better not persist in looking at them." A vegetable seller is weighing a cabbage on a scale and placing it in a basket hanging from a rope by a girl on the terrace.That woman is exactly the same as the girl in our village who went crazy because of a broken relationship and committed suicide.The vegetable vendor looked up: she is my grandmother. I thought: "There comes a point in life when more people you know are dead than alive. Then your heart refuses to accept more faces and more expressions, and the people you meet Every new face is an old face, each finding a suitable mask." The longshoremen march up the stone steps in single file, stooping to carry jars and barrels; their faces are hidden by burlap hoods; "now they'll straighten up, and I'll recognize them," thought I, Anxious and scared.But I cannot take my eyes off of them; if I turn my eyes to the throngs of people in the narrow streets, unexpected faces stare at me from a distance, as if asking me to recognize them, as if wanting to recognize them. Recognize me, seem to have recognized me.In their eyes, maybe I also resemble someone who has passed away.I had only just arrived in Adelma, but already I was one of them, I was already thrown towards them, dissolved into the kaleidoscope of eyes, wrinkles, distorted faces. I thought, "Maybe Adelma is the city you arrive at when you're dying, where everyone can be reunited. That means I'm dead, too." And I thought, "That means the underworld is not happy." city ​​and sky one In Eudohinia, a city that stretches upwards and downwards at the same time, with its many crooked streets, steps, back alleys, and huts, there is preserved a carpet in which you can see the true appearance of the city.At first glance, the pattern of the rug looks nothing like Odoina, because the design of the entire rug is a symmetrical pattern, repeated along straight lines or curves, interspersed with brightly colored spirals.However, if you look carefully, you will agree that each section of the carpet corresponds to a certain place in the city, and at the same time the things of the whole city are included in the carpet, and in the order in which they are arranged. A collision that distracts attention and misses it.Your incomplete observation will notice the chaos of Eudohinia, the braying of donkeys, the smudges of soot, and the smell of fish; yet the carpet proves that from a certain point it is possible to show the true proportions of the city, and its geometry is absolutely out of place. Leaving out even the tiniest detail. It's easy to get lost in Eudocia: but if you look intently at the carpet, you'll see that the street you're looking for is in a circle of crimson or blue or magenta, surrounded by a patch of purple that's your real goal land.Every Odoinian resident compares the fixed pattern of the carpet with the image of the city in his mind. turning point. The Prophet was asked what mystical relation there was between two as different as the rug and the city.The Prophet replied that one of them had the shape God gave to the heavens and the orbits of the planets; the other was an approximate reflection, like all man-made things. There was a time when fortune tellers believed that the harmonious patterns on the carpet belonged to the celestial realm.They interpreted the words of the Prophet according to this conviction, and no one objected.But you can also draw the opposite conclusion: the city of Eudoxia as we see it is the true map of the universe: a shapeless smear of twisted streets, ruined houses piled in dust, flames, Screams in the dark. "It seems that what you experienced is just a memory trip!" Khan, who has a keen hearing, would straighten up in the hammock every time he heard Marco's faint sigh. "You went so far just to get rid of the burden of nostalgia!" he shouted, or: "You came back with a boatload of regrets!" Buy and sell!" This is the ultimate purpose of all Khubilai's questions about the past and the future.He spent the whole hour playing this game, like a cat with a mouse, and finally cornered Marco, beating him, kneeling on his chest, and pulling at his beard: Goods: emotions, happiness, elegy!" These words and actions may be imaginary, because both of them are silently watching the smoke slowly rising from the pipe.Clouds are sometimes blown away by the wind, or remain suspended in midair; the answer lies in the clouds.When the smoke was blowing out, Marco thought of the fog that covered the sea and mountains. After it dissipated, the air would become dry and transparent, and distant cities would appear.The place where he casts his gaze is just beyond the erratic screen of smoke: it can be seen more clearly from a distance. Perhaps, the fog that slowly leaves the lips will still linger, reminding people of a scene: the haze over the capital, the thick smoke that cannot be blown away, and the miasma pressing down on the asphalt road.It is not the restless mist of memory, nor is it dry and transparent, but the scab formed by scorched life on the surface of the city, the sponge soaked with the life fluid that no longer flows, the past, the present and the future The jam of the calcified being blocked by the illusion of movement: this is what you find at the end of the journey.