Chapter 5 Chapter 1 The Birth of a Poet (3)

Back in the studio, the painter found Maman crying: "Excuse me, let me go home right away?" "Come on, you two can leave together. Jaromil will finish his homework." "You are a devil," she said through tears, and the painter kissed her.Then he shuttled back to the next room, praised Jaromil for his homework (oh, what a happy day the child was!) and sent him home.He went back to the studio, laid the weeping Mama on the old paint-stained sofa, kissed her soft mouth and wet cheeks, and made love to her. Mama's love affair with the painter never lost the character that was doomed from the outset: it was not a love she had dreamed of, nor a love she had contemplated; it was an unexpected love that caught her unexpectedly .

This love kept reminding her that she was never prepared for things to happen.She was inexperienced, did not know how to act, how to talk; she was ashamed of her every word, every gesture in the presence of the painter's characteristic, eager face.Her body was also not ready; for the first time she began to regret the neglect of her body after Jaromil was born, and the reflection of the dull, wrinkled skin on her abdomen in the mirror terrified her. Oh, how she yearns for a love in which body and soul will grow old harmoniously. (Yes, the kind of love she expected in advance, a love that was free.) But, in this demanding relationship she had entered so abruptly, her soul seemed painfully young and her body terribly young. The painful oldness of a person makes her walk through this adventure as if her feet are trembling on a tight rope. The immaturity of the soul and the aging of the body can both bring her ruin.

The painter took great care of her and wanted to draw him into his world of painting and thought.Maman liked him that way.This proves that their union is not just two bodies conspiring to exploit a favorable situation.However, if love is to possess not only the body but also the soul, it takes more time; in order to justify her constant absence (especially her grandmother and Jaromil), Mamen had to constantly invent new friends . She always sat beside him while the painter was at work, but this did not satisfy him; he explained to her that art, as he understood it, was merely a means of discovering life's wonderful gifts; A child at play or an ordinary person immersed in a dream can also spot it.He gave Maman paper and colored inks, and told her to stipple the ink on the paper and then blow it;The painter framed Maman's work on the glass panel of the bookcase and proudly showed off to the guests.

On one of her initial visits, when the local was about to leave, he put a few books in her arms and asked her to take them home and read them.She had to read the books secretly, because she was afraid that Jaromil would get curious and ask her where they came from, or that someone else in the family would ask the same question.It was difficult to come up with an appropriate answer, because the covers of the books even looked special, unlike any books on the shelves of her relatives and friends.So she stashed them in a clothes hamper under her bra and pajamas and read them when she was alone.Perhaps it was the feeling that she was doing something forbidden and the fear of being discovered, which prevented her from concentrating on her studies.It can be imagined that she gained very little. In fact, she did not understand many pages, even though she read it two or three times.

She returned the books to the painter with the nervousness of a schoolgirl who hadn't done her homework.He would immediately ask her what she thought of a book, and she knew he wasn't interested in plausible answers, that he wanted to share with her the truths he had discovered together.Maman knew this, but it didn't help her understand what the books were all about, or what the painter thought was important.So, like a sly schoolgirl, she found an excuse: she complained that she had to read these books secretly, so as not to be discovered, so she could not concentrate on them. The painter believed her defense and found a clever solution.The next time Jaromil came to class, the painter gave him a lecture on the currents of modern art and then lent him some books on the subject, which the boy cheerfully accepted.When Mamen first saw the books on Jaromil's desk, she was terrified to realize that the contraband had been secretly prepared for her.Hitherto, the entire burden of her adventures had been borne by her alone, and now her son, the symbol of purity, had become the unwitting messenger of their affair.However, there is no way.These books were placed on his desk, and Maman had no choice but to read them under the pretext of caring for her son.

Once, Mama found the courage to tell the painter that the poems he had lent her seemed needlessly vague.As soon as she said it, she regretted it, because as long as she disagreed with the painter's point of view, he would consider it disloyal.Maman hurried to repair the damage.She quickly removes her coat and bra as the painter turns her displeased face to the canvas.Her breasts are beautiful and she knows it.Now she proudly (but a little hesitantly) carries them across the studio, stopping in front of the painter half-hidden by his easel.The painter adjusts his paintbrush sullenly above the canvas, and from time to time glances annoyed at Maman, who is peeking from behind the painting.She took the paintbrush out of his hand, gritted her teeth, and muttered a word she had never said to anyone, a vulgar, obscene word.She repeated the word several times until she saw the painter's sullenness turn into amorous desire.

No, she had never done this before, and doing it now was very laborious and her muscles were stiff.From the very beginning of their ambiguous relationship, it was clear to her that he expected her to express her affection with banter and indulgence.He wanted complete licentiousness, freedom from custom, shame, and imprisonment.He likes to say, "I don't want anything from you but your freedom. I want you to give me the gift of your complete freedom!" He demands constant proof of this gift.Gradually, Maman somewhat believed that this kind of unrestrained behavior must be a very beautiful thing.But at the same time she was worried that she would never learn it.The harder she tried to learn to let loose, the more her looseness became a burden.It became a task, a task that had to be prepared at home (consider which sentence, which wish, which act would most astonish the painter, and trust her to be of nature), and she began To groan under the burden of the vagabond is like to groan under the weight of the burden.

"The worst thing is not that people are not free, but that people forget their freedom." He often told her, and she felt that this sentence was really applied to her. world. "If we can't change the world, then we should at least change our lives and live freely." He always said, "If everyone's life is unique, let us live uniquely. Let us Abandon everything old. Absolute modernity is necessary." He quoted Rimbaud, and she listened reverently, trusting his words and doubting herself. She thought that perhaps the artist's love was entirely due to a misunderstanding, and she kept asking him why he loved her.He always replied that he loved her as a boxer loves a butterfly, a singer loves silence, and a villain loves a village girl.He always said that he loved her as a butcher loves a calf's timid eyes, and Lightning loves a quiet and simple roof.He told her that he liked her because she was an exciting woman liberated from a dreary world.

She enjoyed listening to him endlessly, and went to see him whenever she could.She felt like a tourist contemplating a beautiful scene, suffocated in too much haste to enjoy the beauty before her.It's true that she won't enjoy her relationship, but she understands that it's something big and beautiful and she can't let it go easily. What about Jaromil?He was very proud that the painter lent him the books in his study (the painter told the children several times that he generally never let his books out of the room, but he made Jaromil a special exception), and because of the large number of Time was at his disposal, and he lost himself dreamily in these pages.At a time when modern art had not yet become stale to the bourgeois masses, it still retained the allure of a genre, an appeal to childhood—an age always yearning for the romance of secret societies, groups, gangs— A narcissist with a magical pull.Jaromil was fascinated by the mysterious atmosphere of these books. He read them very differently from his mother, who read them like a textbook that would be tested, tirelessly, without missing a word.And Jaromil, who didn't have to be afraid of the exam, actually didn't finish a book.He flipped through them, pausing now and then on a page to brood over a few lines, taking no interest in the rest of the poem, as if they had no meaning at all.A line of poetry, a passage of prose, was enough to cheer him up, not only because they were beautiful, but because they were the mystical door to the kingdom of God's chosen ones, whose souls are sensitive to the ambiguity of beings.

Maman knew that her son would not be content with being a messenger, and that he read with genuine interest the books that should only be passed on to her.For she began to talk to him about the common reading, to ask him questions which she dared not ask her lover.She couldn't help but be taken aback to discover that her son defended these borrowed books with even greater zeal than the painter.She noticed that in an anthology of Eluard's poems, he underlined some verses with a pencil: Asleep, with the moon in one eye and the sun in the other. "What do you see in this poem? Why should I sleep with the moon in one eye? Stone legs, sand stockings. How can stockings be sewn with sand?" Jaromil wondered Not only was the mother making fun of the poems, but she was making fun of him too, thinking he was too young to read them.So he got angry and answered her roughly.

Gosh, she failed even in front of a thirteen year old!She went to see the painter that day and felt like a spy in enemy uniform.Her behavior lost any instinctive meaning, and her words and deeds were like an amateur actor with stage fright, reciting her lines timidly, for fear of being coaxed off the stage. At that time, the painter had just discovered the beauty of the camera, and he showed Maman his first pictures, a peaceful world of strangely piled objects, a strange landscape of abandoned and forgotten things.He then asked her to pose under the skylight and began taking pictures of her.At first, Maman felt relieved because she didn't have to talk, she just stood, sat, smiled, followed the painter's command, and listened to his occasional compliments on her figure or face. But suddenly, his eyes sparkled; he picked up a paintbrush, dipped it in black paint, gently turned Maman's head back, and drew two thick lines on her face. "I crossed you out! I canceled God's creation!" He laughed, photographing Maman with two thick lines crossed across his nose.Then lead her to the bathroom, wash her face, and dry her with a towel. "I crossed you out just now so I could recreate you," he said.He picked up the paintbrush again and began to paint on her face again.He drew circles and lines that looked like ancient hieroglyphics. "Faces—prophecies, faces—letters," he said, placing Maman in the light of the tilted skylight again, and pressing the shutter repeatedly. After a while, he made her lie on the floor, and placed a plaster model of an ancient head next to her head, and drew the same lines on it as Maman's face.He took pictures of both heads—one real, one statue—then washed off the symbols on Maman's face, repainted the lines, and took a few more shots.Then put her on the couch and start undressing her.Maman was worried that he would draw symbols on her breasts and legs, and she even wanted to smile in disapproval (this took a lot of courage, because she was always afraid that her attempts at humor would fail and be considered not very funny ), but the painter is no longer interested in her.He made love to her, fondled her head, as if he found it especially exciting to make love to a woman of his own creation, a work of his own imagination, a vision of his own mind.As if he were God, lying beside the woman he created for himself. In fact, at this moment, Maman is just his mental image, his invention.She knows this, and she tries so hard not to let him know it, to keep him from realizing that she is not his other half, a mysterious match worthy of love, but merely a lifeless reflection, a submissive one. The mirror, a passive surface on which he projects the mental image of their desire.She succeeded.The artist reaches a climax of excitement and gleefully slides off her.When she came home she seemed to have been through an ordeal, and before falling asleep that night, she cried. On the next visit to the studio, it was painting and photography again.This time, the artist left her breasts bare, drawing on the beautifully arched surfaces.But Maman rebels against her lover for the first time when he is about to strip her naked. It is difficult to detect her clever technique, and she actively covers her belly during all kinds of flirtations with the painter.Even when undressing, she always wears a wide belt, suggesting that it can make her nudity more exciting; she always pleads for love in the half light; Take it away from the belly and onto the chest.When she was at her wit's end, she turned to her shyness, which he admired and adored (he had told her several times that she was a symbol of innocence, that the first thought of her inspired him to paint the canvas a white figure holding a palette knife). But now the painter wanted her to stand naked in the middle of the studio like a living statue, offering herself to his eye and brush.She resisted.When she told him—as she had done on the first visit—that his demands were crazy, he replied, as he had done then, that yes, love was crazy, and took her clothes off. And just like that, she stood in the middle of the house, unable to think of anything but her belly.She dared not look down, but she still saw it looming before her eyes because she knew it too well from so many desperate glimpses in mirrors.She felt like a huge belly, an ugly wrinkled leather bag.She felt like a woman lying on the operating table with nothing in her head, resigned to the belief that in the end everything would be fine, that the operation and the pain would pass, and there was nothing to do now but endure it. The painter took his brush, dipped it in paint, touched her shoulders, navel, thighs, stepped back, picked up the camera; then he led her to the bathroom, let her lie in the empty bathtub, and put A bent metal shower hose with a hole in one end, told her that this metal snake does not spit water, but deadly poison, and that it presses down on her like a hand of war on love's throat, and then He took her back to the room and took a few more pictures, she endured obediently, no longer trying to hide her belly, but in her imagination she still saw it in front of her eyes, she saw his eyes and her belly, her belly Belly and his eyes... Finally, he lays her all painted on the carpet, and makes love to her next to the indifferent, beautiful ancient head.Maman couldn't take it any longer and sobbed in his arms.He probably didn't understand why she was crying, because he believed that his passionate concentration translated into beautiful, sustained, rhythmic movements could only drive her away. Realizing that the painter hadn't understood what happened, Maman recovered and stopped crying.But when she walked up the stairs at home, she felt dizzy and fell on the stairs, scraping her knee.Grandma, terrified, carried her back to her room, touched her forehead, and put a thermometer under her arm. Maman has a high fever.Maman's spirit has broken down. A few days later, Czech paratroopers dispatched from London killed the German overlord of Bohemia.Martial law was declared, and notices were posted on street corners with a long list of executed people. Maman lay in bed, and the doctor came to give her injections every day.The doctor often came and sat on the head of her bed, held her hand, and looked into her eyes.Maman knew that he attributed her nervous breakdown to the horrors of contemporary events, and she was ashamed to realize that she was deceiving him, while he was so kind and tender, trying to help her through difficult times like a true friend. One day, Magda, the maid who had lived in the villa for many years, came home crying (about this maid, grandma likes to say—in good, old democratic tradition—she didn’t see her as a servant, but as a member of the family), because she learned that her fiancé had been arrested by the Gestapo.Sure enough, a few days later his name appeared in black letters among the names of the executed hostages on the crimson notice, and Magda left for a few days to visit the young man's parents. Magda returned and said her fiancé's family hadn't even got his urn, and they might never know where their son's remains were.She began to cry suddenly, and she cried almost every day thereafter, usually in her own little room so that her sobs could be blocked by the walls, but sometimes she burst into tears during meals; After the misfortune the family let her dine with them (she used to eat alone in the kitchen), and this extraordinary kindness reminded her every day that she was in mourning, that she was the object of pity, and that her The eyes will turn red, and tears will roll down the cheeks and fall into the pan.Magda tried to hide her tears and bloodshot eyes, and she lowered her head, hoping that her sorrow would go unnoticed, but it only made them more worried; if anyone decided to say something cheerful, she would burst into tears stand up. Jaromil observed all this as if watching a good theatrical performance; he longed to see the teardrops in the girl's eyes, then to see her shyness as she tried to hide her sorrow, and then to watch the tears finally fell down.He stared greedily at her face (surreptitiously, because he felt he was doing something forbidden), and was filled with excitement, longing to cover it gently, to touch it, to comfort it.At night, when he was lying alone in bed, he imagined himself touching that face and saying, don't cry, don't cry, don't cry, because he couldn't think of anything else. Mama's nervous breakdown gradually improved (she relied on proven home remedies, namely prolonged bed rest), and she began to move around the house again, go shopping at the market, and tend to the house, although she still complained of headaches , palpitations.One day she sat down at her desk and began to write a letter.She realized before she wrote the first sentence that the painter would think her stupid and sentimental, and she was afraid of his judgment.But then she collected herself and said to herself that she neither asked for nor expected an answer to these words, that these were the last words she would ever say to him, and that thought gave her the courage to go on.With a sense of relief (a strange sense of challenge) she crafted sentences in which she rediscovered her self—the real, familiar self of those good days before she met him.She loves him, she writes, and she will never forget the heart-wrenching moments they spent together, however, it is time to tell him the truth: she is not what he imagines, nothing; She's just a plain old-fashioned woman who fears that one day she won't be able to look her innocent son in the eye, So, she finally told him the truth?Oh, not at all.She didn't even hint to him that what she once called bliss in love was really just a labor of love; she didn't write at all about her ugly belly and her nervous breakdown, her busted knee and a week of bed rest rest.She didn't write about these things because such sincerity had nothing to do with her.Although she finally wants to restore herself, she can only restore herself in insincerity.After all, if she told her everything frankly, it would be like lying in front of him with her wrinkled belly exposed.No, she would no longer reveal herself to him, inside or out; she wanted to keep herself safe in her solemnity, so she had to be hypocritical, writing nothing but children and the sacred duty of motherhood.When she wrote this letter, she herself believed that what caused her spiritual crisis was neither her belly, nor her exhausted agreement with the painter's thoughts, but her disgust with the maternal feeling of a great and evil love. At this moment she saw herself not only as infinitely sad, but as noble, unfortunate, and strong; and it was a relief that what a few days ago had been mere stinging sorrow now spoke to the language of dignity.It was beautiful sadness, and she saw herself illuminated by the radiance of melancholy, sad and beautiful at the same time. What a strange coincidence!Jaromil, who was fascinated by Magda's tears, also understood the beauty of sadness, and indulged himself in the joy of sadness.He is still flipping through the painter's book, constantly reciting Eluard's poems, intoxicating himself in those charming lines: in the silence of her body, a snowball, an eye-limited color; you Eyes filled with the distant sea; Or my beloved's eyes with sorrow.Éluard became the poet who described Magda's demure body and tearful eyes.He found himself completely overwhelmed by a line of poetry: Depressed and moving face.Yes, this is Magda: a sullen and charming face. One night, the whole family went out to the theater, and only he and she stayed at home alone.He had already memorized her personal habits. He knew that it was Saturday night and Magda always had to take a bath.Since her parents and grandmother had planned to go to the theater a week in advance, he had time to get everything ready.A few days ago, he had removed the keyhole cover from the bathtub door and sealed it with a loaf of crumpled bread.In order to expand his vision, he pulled out the key on the door and hid it.No one noticed that the keys were missing, and no one in the family had the habit of locking themselves in the bathroom.Only Magda locked the bathroom door. The whole house was very quiet and seemed to be empty.Jaromil's heart was pounding in his chest.Upstairs he was in his room, with a book open, in case anyone should ask what he was doing; but he was not reading, but listening.Finally, he heard the sound of water flowing in the pipes and the splash of water rushing into the bathtub.He turned off the light in the hallway and tiptoed down the stairs; he was lucky; the keyhole was still uncovered, he put his eyes up and saw Magda leaning over the bathtub, naked, her breasts exposed, wearing only a pair of shorts.His heart was beating wildly, he saw things he had never seen before, and he knew he would see more soon, and no one could stop it.Magda straightened up, went to the mirror (he saw her in profile), looked in the mirror for a while, then turned around (he saw her in front now) and went to the bathtub.She stopped, took off her panties, threw them aside (he could still see her front), and climbed into the tub. Even in the bathroom, Jaromil could still see her, but as the water reached her shoulders, she became a face again, the familiar sad face with eyes wet with tears —but at the same time a different face.He had to mentally add (now, next time, always) a pair of naked breasts, belly, thighs, ass to her.It's a face illuminated by nudity.The face still stirred warmth in him, but even that warmth was different because it was now accompanied by a racing heart. Then suddenly he saw Magda looking straight into his eyes.He feared he had been found out.She was gazing into the keyhole with a smile (a little shyly, a little tenderly).He hurried away from the door.Did she see him?He had experimented with the keyhole many times, and he was sure not to see a prying eye through it.But how to explain Magda's look and smile?Was she just looking in his direction by chance, or was she just smiling at the possibility of Jaromil peeping in?But in any case, meeting Magda's eyes so disconcerted him that he dared not approach the door again. After a while, as he regained his composure, a startling thought flashed through his mind: the bathroom was unlocked, and Magda hadn't told him she was going to take a shower.What if he pretended not to know and just happened to walk into the bathroom?His heart started beating again.He imagined this scene: At the open door, he stopped, startled, and said, very casually, I just wanted to get my toothbrush.She walked past the naked, dumbfounded Magda as if nothing had happened; her beautiful face looked embarrassed, as it does when tears burst out at the dinner table.He walked past the bathtub, reached the washstand, picked up his toothbrush, stopped by the bathtub, and bent over Magda, towards the naked body gleaming under the pale green water; he gazed at her body, her The shy face, stroking and caressing it... Ah, thinking of this, his mind went blank with excitement, and he couldn't think any more. In order to make his intrusion seem natural, he crept back up the stairs quietly, and then came down with a deliberately heavy step; he was aware that he was trembling, and worried that he did not need to say in a calm, nonchalant tone, I just wanted to get my toothbrush; but he kept walking, and when he was almost in the bathroom, his heart was beating so hard that he could barely breathe, he heard: "Jaromil, I'm taking a shower! Don't come in !" He replied: Oh, no, I'm going to the kitchen.So he actually went across the hall to the other side, to the kitchen, opened the door, closed it, and went back to his room. It was only then that he realized that those few unexpected words were no excuse for his cowardly submission, and he could have replied quite naturally, it's okay, Magda, I'm just here to get my toothbrush, and then just Going in, Magda would certainly not have denounced him; she liked him because he had always been good to her.He once again imagined how he would walk into the bathroom in a big way, and Magda lying in the bathtub was exposed in front of him, and shouted: What are you doing, go away!But she can't do anything.She couldn't protect herself, just like she couldn't do anything about her fiancé's death, she was lying in the bathtub and couldn't move, while he bent down to her face, her big eyes... But the fantasy faded away irrevocably, and Jaromil heard the muffled sound of water flowing from the bathtub into a distant pipe. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity was gone forever, and he was very annoyed, because he knew it might take a long time. Only then would he have the chance to be alone with Magda again, and even if he had such a chance, the key to the bathroom door would have been changed long ago, and Magda would lock herself safely inside.He leaned back on the sofa in great frustration.But what hurt him more was not his missed opportunities, but his lack of courage—his weakness, his stupid beating heart, which made him panic and screwed everything up.He was suddenly filled with intense loathing for himself. What to do with such disgust?This feeling is quite different from sadness; in fact, it is the exact opposite of sadness.Whenever people give orders to Jaromil, he always shuts himself in his room and weeps, but it is joyful, tears of joy, tears of love, and Jaromil can use this to feel sorry for himself or This is comforting.On the contrary, this sudden dislike showed Jaromil his weakness, which made him very unhappy.The disgust was as clear as an insult, as unmistakable as a slap.The only salvation is to flee. But if we suddenly face our own insignificance, where can we escape?To get rid of humbleness, the only way out is to go high!So he sat down, opened a book (it was the precious book that the painter claimed he had never lent to anyone but Jaromil), and tried to concentrate on his favorite poetry.He read again that your eyes are soaked with the distant sea, and Maruta appeared before his eyes again.The snowdrop in the stillness of her body is there, and the splash of the waves echoes in the poetry like the sound of the river flowing through the window.Jaromil was so sad that he closed the book, picked up a pencil, and began to write.He imagined himself to be Éluard, Nezvall, and other poets, writing short lines without meter or rhyme.They were remakes of a string of poems he had just read, but that remake also had his own personal lived experience.There is sorrow in the poem, it melts and becomes water, there is green water in the poem, the water rises higher and higher until it reaches my eyes, there is a body in the poem, a sad body, a body in the water, behind which I Take big strides.Across boundless waters. He recited his poems over and over, with singing melancholy intonations, and felt complacent.The poem centers on Magda taking a bath, with his face pressed against the door.Thus he finds himself not beyond the sphere of his experience, he is rising above it; his loathing of himself is left below.Below, his palms were sweating with tension, and above, in the realm of poetry, he was well above his clumsiness.This episode of the keyhole and his cowardice became a spring on which he now prancing.He is no longer controlled by his experiences; his experiences are controlled by what he writes. The next day he asked his grandmother to let him use the typewriter; he typed the poem on special paper, and the poem was even more beautiful than when he read it aloud, for it was no longer a mere set of words but a An object; its independence is unquestionable; ordinary words disappear as soon as they are uttered, because they serve only for a moment's communication of thought; they are subordinate to the object, and are merely symbols of it.With poetry, words themselves become objects, no longer subordinate to anything.They are not ephemeral symbols, not fleeting, but eternal. What Jaromil experienced the day before is now written into the poem, but at the same time, it is gradually withering like a dying seed in a fruit.I'm submerged, my heart beating in circles on the surface.The line describes a boy who stands trembling at the bathroom door, and at the same time the boy is swallowed up by the line; it outlives him, outlives him.Ah, my love in the water, another line says that Jaromil knows that the love in the water is Magda; he also knows that no one can find her in this line, she is lost, disappeared, hidden here in a line; he wrote a poem as independent and esoteric as reality itself.Reality is not discussed, it just exists.The poem's independence provides Jaromil with a hidden and strange world, the possibility of a second existence.He liked it so much that the next day he tried to write some poems, and he gradually indulged in this creative activity. Although she was out of the hospital bed and walking about the house like a recovering patient, she was not at all happy.She has rejected the painter's love, but she has not received her husband's love in return.Jaromil's father was hardly at home!They are used to him coming back late at night, and even not seeing him for three or four days, because they know that he travels a lot for work, but this time he didn't say anything, he just didn't come home at night, and Maman didn't know it at all where is he. Jaromil hardly saw his father, he didn't even notice that he was not at home.He stays in his room, thinking about poetry: if a poem is to be a real poem, it must be read by someone other than the author; only then will it prove that it is not just a diary in disguise, it can stand on its own , independent of whoever wrote it.At first he wanted to show his poems to painters, but they were so important to him that he dared not subject them to such a severe criticism.He longed to find someone who felt the same way he felt about these poems, and he realized who his destined reader was; he saw the sadness in his potential reader's eyes, the pain in his voice, Walking around the house, it seemed to Jaromil that she was walking directly towards his poems.With excitement, he gave Maman some carefully typed poems, and ran back to his room, waiting for her to call him when she had finished reading them. She read and she cried.Maybe even she herself didn't know why she was crying, but it's not difficult for us to imagine.There were four kinds of tears in her eyes. First, she was struck by the resemblance between Jaromil's poems and those the painter had lent him, and her eyes filled with tears of mourning for a lost love. Then, feeling a general sadness in her son's verse, she remembered that her husband had been away for two days without even saying hello, and she shed tears of insult and hurt. Almost at the same time, she shed tears of consolation, for her son—who gave her his poems with such timid love—was the source of healing for all these wounds. After reading these poems several times, she shed tears of deep admiration at first. These poems seemed mysterious to her, so she felt that they contained deep meanings that she could not understand. Then, she is a very talented mother of the child. She called him in, but as soon as he stood in front of her she felt like a painter when he asks about the book he lent her; she didn't know what to say to the poems; she looked at his eager expectant face , apart from hugging and kissing him, I can't think of anything.Jaromil was tense, and being able to bury his face in Mamen's shoulders made him feel relieved.Conversely, feeling the small body in her arms, she also got rid of the heavy shadow of the painter, summoned up her courage, and began to speak.But she couldn't hide the hoarseness of her voice and the moistness of her eyes, which seemed to Jaromil more meaningful than her words.The emotion in his mother's voice and eyes was a divine guarantee that his poetry had power—real, tangible power. It was getting dark, and Jaromil's father hadn't come home yet, and Maman suddenly felt that Jaromil's face was filled with a kind of gentle beauty, which was incomparable to both the painter and her husband; this inappropriate thought was So strong that she could not shake it off; and she began to tell him how, during her pregnancy, she had often looked at the statue of Apollo with imploring eyes, "You see, you are as beautiful as Apollo, and you are so beautiful." Like him. People say that what a mother thinks when she conceives sometimes finds fulfillment in her child, and I'm beginning to think that's more than just a superstition. You've inherited his lyre." Then she told him that literature had always been her greatest passion.She went to college mainly to study literature, and it was only her marriage (she did not say she was pregnant) that prevented her from dedicating herself to this deep love.How surprising it would be if he knew now that Jaromil was a poet (yes, she was the first to ascribe this great title to him), but that was something she had longed for. They find comfort in each other, these two unsuccessful lovers, mother and son, long into the night.