Fire out of Water

My eyes opened to something red, from my pillow I could directly see the sky. As I reached the water, the cyclamen and blue colours had already turned smoothly into dull, whitish blue. I was swimming in the middle of the bay when the thin upper slice of the dark red circular patch appeared on the horizon. It was rising and becoming round quickly. 

Constellations always move at an indiscernibly slow speed, no matter how hard I look, they seem to stand still. I can only discern their movement from their changing position: a couple of minutes ago I could still see the pole of the Wagon, and now it has disappeared behind the hill. My eyes could follow the change of this circle of fire, however.

The Aegean in September is lukewarm and salty, and floats you without swimming. I am weightless and my body is full of joy. 

The rising round thing moves me to humility: could this little ball be the sun? My face is at the level of the water, without blinking I stare at the slice which quickly becomes round. It is already a circle, but it is not a complete circle yet, from its lower tangent a lever reaches into the water, like a round mirror with a handle. The fire-lever stretches, and then breaks and falls behind the horizon. The full circle is rising now, unstoppable, in triumphant majesty, it is already the sun, it has light, it runs its course, it gives warmth. It can’t be looked at, it is dazzling. I move, I feel the breeze in my hair, my thoughts start out, I am looking for a direction, I can feel my body. It was not my everyday body, not the thing given birth to as a unity 70 years ago that was working just now. I swim slowly, the salty sea embraces me. I would like to cry a little bit, to cry softly, light tears. 

I let a child go. He clung to me, he could not trust anybody else. I let him go, sent him his way, to nothing. Did I teach him? I should have cured him.

The warm waves are tending my body in vain, the shining sun high above sticks shafts into my soul. I sinned against love. No remission.

We were having a course in a pretty village among the mountains. A lot of people came from many places and with many different expectations: to witness wonders, to cuddle up in a music-nest, or to get warm among music-secrets.

Who will I find there? I cherish the hope that I may meet helpers, teachers. If I could just put my “science” into their hands, here you are, go on with it, make it better! So many people! They come, arrive, carry things, settle down. We get to know each other.

Robi is coming, bear-like, snorting. He is fourteen, they made him puffy, fat with medicines. He is hugged by many, the older ones recognize and greet him familiarly. “Reed Fairy!” he says and hugs her above the wheelchair. The Reed Fairy is chirping a delicate bird-greeting. Robi is melting, even his eyes are smiling behind the thick glasses. The birdsong is almost real, only a Reed Fairy can do it this way. I would happily hide now, there’s no need of me here, these two are the tree and the bough. One is Love, healing unction made of fragrant oils in a in a fragile ceramic phial. The other is a tilting balance, neurologists would try to cure him. Teachers had given up a long time ago.

Robi lives in the private ward of a pleasant treatment centre abroad, they lock him up, let him out, he rages, smashes everything around him, they lock him up again with some new medicine. They wave their hand in resignation and avoid him like the plague. He can’t be loved, he doesn’t let you do it, he can’t tolerate it, he hits those first who would love him. “I don’t believe in emotions” he explains “my mum doesn’t know them, nor do I. I had to choose whether I have emotions or knowledge, and I chose knowledge”. I listen to him, look at him, hold on to him, as if he were flying away or sinking. Like the girl in Andersen’s tale who stepped on bread. The girl, Klári, did not love anybody, she was vain, selfish, she threw the bread she received as a gift into the mud and stepped on it, she protected her pretty shoes in this way. She sank to hell together with the bread. Her suffering is described in Dantean terms, finally she is freed by a little girl’s single teardrop who sincerely feels for her.

Do I have tears for Robi? He threw the bread of emotions under his feet, because he wanted to know everything, all of the sciences. He reads, and reads, an incredible amount of books, articles, reviews from any source. He hasn’t been attending school for years now. He can’t tolerate children, they can’t tolerate him either, they can’t bear the sight of him and cast him out. That’s what they did to him in Hungary, from kindergarten through school, in any community, in the family, among friends, in company, on the courtyard of a block of flats, in the park, or at the playground. He was beaten. And he was beating the weaker ones.

Adults sometimes understand him, they try to communicate to him, they are wondering at his knowledge, they get him to speak, listen to him amazed. That is how I listen to him, because he knows all the things that I don’t know. I couldn’t be his partner, only his listener. He talks about nuclear physics, inventions, systems, the decay and swift destruction of the world. “Human irresponsibility is destructive – he explains – there is no escape from it, they destroy the plants, the animals, the air, the soil, the people, too. Everything”. “It is a question of just a little time” – he says in natural voice as if he were discussing the weather. As we say “It will rain today”. And Robi: “Soon there will be a machine, a little one, about this size – he shows – you will only have to push one button and the world is over. That is, the Earth will be destroyed. Everything”. He falls into deep thought. I am looking at the pine tree, he is not; he is staring into space, at somewhere faraway. “Perhaps I’ll be the one to push the button of destruction”. I don’t say anything or protest. Still, after a bit of silence, he continues thus: “Perhaps I would be sorry for some people. For these here, you all”. Budding gratitude in my heart, I am about to open my mouth and say something. Robi is quicker: “All in vain, no one can be saved. Everybody has to die”.

I am sitting by him helplessly, crying for him with inward tears, I love him so much I would hide him in my apron and hide with him. I have never had a student whom I loved so much. He knows this. He said to me once: “You are entirely made of love” and he showed it “from top to bottom. Even your hair. Everything”. He smiled at me benevolently and tolerantly as someone who forgives my weakness and ignorance. The world is to be blown up, the machines are ready and here I am making music. “You are made of love exclusively” he said “even your bones”. He is not joking, he says this seriously as he is serious about blowing up the world.

He speaks fluently in Hungarian, French and Hebrew. What does he read besides the mass of science-fiction books? Psychology, most profoundly. What about poems? Literature? “I don’t read those. I get bored with them” – he says plainly.

I don’t even think about recommending him a book or a poem. I can’t recommend life to him. Death and destruction had been implanted in him, with thousands of tangled roots. His soul has been as nurtured with poison as his body has been blown up with poisons. He couldn’t be hushed or appeased, encouraged or calmed.

It’s evening, we are sitting in candlelight with music, I am holding his hands or just touching him. I would look for a partner for him, I am stepping about barefoot among the people lying, crouching or dancing on the floor. Partners for Robi? Not children, no, unfortunately, it can’t be children. Maybe an adult. Where is Ildikó? Where is Eszter? My eyes are searching in the half-light. I am looking for a warm stove for a frostbitten child. I would dance but Robi is sitting heavily, his body is sinking into the floor. I kneel down by him and hold his hand, Bach’s music trembles through our bones, even his, too, I know.

In the evening Tamás sees him home. The following day, too. On the third day he arrives boiling with rage, there was a family quarrel, the usual stuff, meaningless and not to be understood. Should he move out: Should he stay in the little house they rent on the riverside, at the end of the dark street? He would like to stay, his mother won’t let him, they quarrel. Robi puts the keys to the house in his pocket.

That is how we start our singing lesson, Robi stands in the circle with us. “Two peonies have leant out to the road…”, in the middle of the circle there are more and more people “metamorphosed”, peonies, dewdrops, ants, blades of grass, ladybirds with seven spots. Robi is still going round in circles, he is full of expectations, smiling, somebody will choose him soon, look into his eyes and take him inside to “metamorphose”, the way we do it. But Eszter is running from the house, rushing to Robi and whispering into his ears. Robi’s face darkens, he snaps back. Eszter is standing helplessly, then she starts on her way back. Robi is singing peonies with dark defiance. He is about to be chosen when Eszter is running again “Sorry, I must…” she says looking at me. I nod in assent, and continue the lesson, this is a course, people have been preparing for months to get here and I am teaching here. Teaching! Robi reaches into his pocket hands Eszter the keys, and metamorphoses all the same, he doesn’t say into what. I don’t inquire. There is nobody going around in circles now, all of us are crouching on the grass, in a close heap, touching one another, among softly buzzing sounds. Personal tunes are clinging to the peonies tune, they are wreathing, bubbling, spreading, dissolving into little pieces, becoming laced and straightening into one another, spontaneously in the clear fragrance of the pines among the mountains. I am enchanted by it and get absorbed in it. 

Hours later I get to know that Robi was thrown out and he will live at our place. “Where at our place? We don’t have more rooms!” “There is a couch in the hall”. But the hall people come and go, he won’t have a calm moment, I am aware of his need of privacy, he will burst with rage. Robi is angry and humiliated, he doesn’t have a place to go, the hall will do. 

He is woken up early, he can’t go to sleep until late in the evening and he doesn’t have a nook to hide. I would despair, too, I would get tired.

We put his bedding in the hall, day by day we make him put his stuff and shoes away. Robi is grumpy, bitter and shows his unpleasant face. If the two of us could sit down by the pine and he could talk away his problems!

Klári is teaching, teaching, teaching, fifty people, small group, large group, small group, large group. 

Robi is quarrelling, he is rude, ruthless, he pushes others, the little ones. Adults are watching me: what will happen to Robi? The conversations between the two of us become less and less frequent, Robi mingles with the children with a bored sense of superiority, a child is not a partner for him, children have never been partners to him, not even at the age of eight. At lunch time he is walking about bear-like. “Aren’t you having lunch, my dear Robi?” “How could I be? They serve pork.” “Anything else instead of that?” “I don’t eat that kind of food…” I mutter to myself helplessly. “Would you like some quark?” “I hate it! And I hate everybody. I heard today that disgusting guy saying about me: What does the puffy want? – They have no idea about anything, they are stupid, I’m going to smash their faces.” “Robi!” “I know, I know, I’m not going to hurt anybody here, but only out of regard for you”.

At breakfast the good-hearted Andrea tells about Robi’s adventure yesterday, she is sad and helpless. “I said this, he said that…” He is unbearable among children.

My herbal tea seems to be more bitter than yesterday. It seems to be salty, too. Am I swallowing my tears?

We set out to the meadow, soft-headed wild flowers are swinging on the great field, unknown fuzzy heads on long, swaying flower-stalks. Their multitude is touching, tiny fleecy clouds, under them are all the colourful wild flowers of the rainy summer, many-many, countless of them. Looking closely at a tiny patch of them, it is their variety, watching their extended swaying, on the other hand, it is the unified whole that is enchanting. I have been looking at it for days now. Which Bach piece should I choose to it? What should we paint on? I dream up and devise the whole thing meticulously. Tamás and his helpers stretch the long sheet of paper on planks, this way children can reach, too. Is it fluttering a bit? All the better! Twenty people can sit by it, the space is common, but everybody can paint on his or her chosen surface. The strings of our harp are tuned up, everyone is helping, everyone is trying, we don’t get tired even close to the last days. 

The sun is shining on the meadow, its rays do somersaults on every petal and flower-head, it was raining at night, the grass is dewy, only the sea can show such moving brilliance. We dance round singing on the spot mowed down, there are many children today, they all listen. Adults get attuned, too, they realize why we had to walk so much today and why exactly to this place. 

Our singing is interrupted by yelling from the top of the hill, a lean old man is cursing “Get out of there, damn you, you tread down my grass. I’ll sue you, the village council will come”. Hands fall, frightened silence. I run up the slope to appease the old man. I grew up in a village, I know about scything, we don’t tread on the grass, as you can see, we were dancing on the spot mowed down, and only looking at the other half so that we would paint from up there. The old man is a steaming boiler, it is hard to calm him down. “there are children – he grumbles – they will raid it”. “Not our children. Look! Not one of them stepped into the unmowed part”. “They will though, and then I won’t be able to mow it. What a shame! How will I feed the cattle?” the wheels of his quarrelling roll on, slowing down gradually. “God bless you! Have a nice Sunday!” I say goodbye to him.

At the bottom my people are awaiting me anxiously. Bori is whispering into her mother’s ears. “Will the old man mow down Klári with the scythe?” Our singing stops, but we still look around at the hills. They surround us as a wreath and the snow-white Chapel of St. Vid is smiling at us from the top. “That is where you were blowing soap-bubble messages yesterday with Zsóka”. Everything is cosy. We are walking home, my relaxed arms embrace those who are close, my heart is uplifted as I look at Robi. He is coming with Konstantina, deep in conversation. One couldn’t imagine a better choice. The twenty-year-old Konstantina is harmony and delight herself, even the sun’s rays stop for some rest on her beautiful face and eyes. She was born in Costa-Rica, the other day she was telling me about her home, she is full of life and attention, it’s so good that she is walking with Robi. Robi is walking calmly and cheerfully, no dragging of feet, no bear-like movements now. They go straight to the paints, and Robi starts using the colours immediately. While the others are preparing, searching and daubing, Robi has already drawn up the hill of St. Vid, together with the chapel and the pine tree, in perspective, it is incredibly real, everything is in place. The colours are alive, there are not vague spots, no searching. Robi is painting as if he had the sign in his fingertips, it is simply there on the paper, the way we saw it. In the meanwhile he is chatting with Konstantina, their pictures meet at some point. 

At the age of eight Robi was painting black-spotted wild things, spots on spots. Now I am amazed by the beauty of his work. Did anyone see this abroad? His doctors who fed him tranquillizers, his teachers who sent him home from school day by day. 

Robi is looking for a thin brush now with which he will spot the old man with the scythe in the middle of the hillside with thick black paint. The man with a scythe is a small, slim grasshopper. Robi is ready, he takes his seat by me. We talk.

The imagination-exercise I learnt from my old yoga-teacher, Péter, occurs to me now: as if I were growing inside a sphere my whole air surrounding me, in safety, in unbroken unity. There are two of us now in this sphere. Robi is speaking. About himself, true things. In our sphere there is pine-fragrance and greenish lights, like the twilight lights of the forest, I would like to stay and to breathe. My child has started out on his way upwards. I am listening to him. He is speaking about the hospital. His thoughts are about the movement at the beginning, the books and the harpsichord. His speech is purling like brooks, smoothly, without stops. I hold my hands under the glittering, cool water.

But István stands in front of us, looking firmly into Robi’s eyes, saying: “My little daughter is crying in her bed upstairs, and she doesn’t dare to come down because Robi said he would kill her with a big knife. If I were your father, I would give you such a spanking now that you wouldn’t know who you are afterwards. I won’t hit you, just look into your eyes and ask: do you know what you did?” Robi is not defending himself, embarrassed, he cowers, and seems almost to melt from the chair. István asks: “What would you say if I just packed up my family now and dashed home from this place?”

István is an intelligent adult, a good father, and he is right. He talked like a pedagogue.

I am sitting on the chair, all my bones are aching, as if I were thrashed. I have no words, no voice, I couldn’t even groan. 

Robi comes to in the end and begins his terrible hate-talk immediately. “That girl is a psychopath, she is afraid of everything, I could really kill her, anyway, everybody will soon be killed by a nuclear explosion, the machine is almost ready, and I will be the one to push the button…” “Robi, what would you do in my place now?” Robi is not even hesitating. “I have to go home, right? You can’t protect me here?” “No, Robi, I can’t. I am responsible for children here.” Robi stands up and goes to pack up his things. The car is going to the train soon. I put my head on the car-top, and call from there: “Call Konstantina”. Konstantina comes running, straight to Robi. She doesn’t know about anything that just occurred. The paint hasn’t dried on their picture yet. “Where are you going, Robi?” Among all of us she was the one who deserved the farewell-hug Robi gave her. They exchanged addresses, too. “Do write, will you?”

In the evening Konstantina and I are writing a letter. A letter, what is it? Still, we go on writing.

István and his family are sorry. He needn’t have been sent home.

No, he needn’t. I am looking at the stars during this last night in Velem and am complaining to them: “I am not a juggler or an acrobat to spin the hoops of teaching with my two hands, or those of therapy with legs, standing on a high-wire stretched far above without a safety net below. I am tired. I would like to sleep: to sleep, to forget”.

How magnanimous he was. “You can’t protect me here!” Protect him, from what? We were living in a nest here, you too, Robi, together with us. Still, you always felt you were grabbing the eternal knife. Once he stabbed one of his schoolmates in the arm. “He was abusing my father”. Poor Bori didn’t even dare to tell anyone. But she was afraid. Those who are frightened will be afraid. It is a cruel reality.

A teacher should teach. A therapist should cure. “Take care of fire and water” the night-watchman used to cry at midnight in our village. And if fire rises out of water?