Her form was as a dark guitar, and her eyes held silence. She, more than anyone, taught me the value of beauty. She, more than anyone, taught me to sigh. When I looked at her I was able to smile.
I took a job in the village mending shoes, a skill I had been lucky enough to learn from my father. Sometimes in the evenings I would sing in the plaza. People dropped money into my outstretched hat. The moon looked on wryly as it rose in the air.
On my return she would smile. We would cook and eat. I told her of the old man I had met on the way. How his eyes seemed to see into the heart of desire, into the sighs that breathe out from the invisible worlds that surround us everywhere, both night and day.
She said: “Such a person is rare today. Perhaps you will have an unusual fate.”
We hoped for a child, but it did not come. After four years, she said: “While it is true not everyone is fulfilled by children, without a child I believe I will die.”
Then she asked me to leave, and I made my preparations as we said our goodbyes. That was late spring. The trees were heavy with blossoms.
From the pink and white buildings birds poured into the sky. Friends asked, “where are you going?” But I had no answer, so I told them I was going to find my fate.
One said: But your fate will find you. Don’t you know that? I could not help but hang my head.
As I walked along the road etched into the hillside, I saw the sparrows skim the sea. White foam spread its veins after a surge of broken waves.