Eva Colombo, Music for water women, third chapter: Melancholy and Ocean
 
Eva Colombo, Music for water women, third chapter: Melancholy and Ocean
I know the way you feel. You wish you could close your eyes and see the future in your dreams. You wish you could stay still and yet feel your life running. But you can’t close your eyes and you see just tears, tears mirroring what you wish to forget.
There’s nothing in my dreams / Just some ugly memories / Kiss me like the Ocean breeze ( Iggy and The Stooges, Gimme Danger, Raw Power )
You wish the Ocean breeze to kiss you soothing the burning of these tears…It will not happen, not now. There is something you have to know, before. Listen. The Ocean is bitter with the tears shed by anyone that feels the sensation of having memories only. An angel sitting by the Ocean with her wings creates the breeze which is the only mean capable of soothing the burning of these tears. But the angel moves her wings only for those persons aware of the true nature of these tears: they are pearls of a shipwrecked treasure which is about to emerge again from the Ocean. They are precious, I’m assuring you. Look carefully: they don’t mirror your ugly memories only, look in the background…don’t you see a glimmering, a glimmering of haze touched with the gold of dawn? No? I’ll tell you a tale, then. I don’t care you believe this tale, It’s enough for me that you know it. A November night, some years ago. All day long I hoped that each step of mine would push my life forward…but drops of rain were to me jail’s bars, falling leaves blindfolds on my eyes. At night the rain was ceased and a merciful haze veiled the moon so I was able to stand moon’s beauty. Yes, it was a full – moon Friday…I told you that I don’t expect you to believe me. But I wasn’t able to close my eyes and I was staring at the moon veiled by the haze and I was thinking how beautiful would be falling asleep and seeing that veiled moon in my dreams. And I fell asleep. And I dreamt. I had to gain a treasure due to me from a long time. A treasure shipwrecked into the Ocean, a treasure which was about to emerge again…for me. But a veiled woman on guard over this treasure told me that I should answer a couple of questions, before. She asked me if I remembered what I had done on March 10, 1975. She asked me if I remembered why that day was the “Melancholy’s Day”. I don’t believe you, I told her. In 1975 I wasn’t born yet. The “Melancholy’s Day” means nothing, I told her, you’re fooling me around. Then she got angry and sent me away and I went away empty – handed. I awaked. The moon had set, the haze was touched with the gold of dawn and I was serene. Yes, there wasn’t any apparent reason for my serenity…but I felt the sensation that my life ran again. Not in the direction I was expecting, but nevertheless it has begun to run again. With open eyes I saw again the beautiful and sever face of that veiled woman and I wept thinking about the silly words I’ve told her, silly words that cost me a treasure. I looked for Durer’s engraving, Melencolia I. Melancholy is an angel, and angels are messengers: she will bring to me the meaning of that dream, I thought. Yes, that very Melancholy who had made me weep so many times all over my life, who made me weep even in that very moment. With her help I will go back to the veiled woman, I thought, I will properly answer her questions and the treasure due to me from a long time will be mine…at last. And I knew that my tears were pearls of a shipwrecked treasure, that treasure which is about to emerge again from the Ocean to be mine at last. I shouldn’t fear Melancholy, she is an angel…an angel sitting by the Ocean. A dog at her feet, an hourglass behind her shoulders.
Now I’m ready to close my eyes / And now I’m ready to close my mind / And now I’m ready to feel your hand / And lose my heart on the burning sands ( The Stooges, I wanna be your dog, The Stooges )
That’s what I should do, that’s what you too have to do right now: close the eyes, crouch at her feet and long for her caress…Melancholy’s caress.
And now I wanna be your dog ( The Stooges, I wanna be your dog, The Stooges )
Melancholy’s dog winds round itself imitating the eternity’s serpent. Its eyes are closed and surely it is dreaming. And surely it feels that even standing still its life runs. Not in a linear way, perhaps, but nevertheless it runs like a whirlpool in a river.
There’s nothing left alive / But a pair of glassy eyes ( Iggy and The Stooges, Gimme Danger, Raw Power )
No, it isn’t true that nothing of your own is left alive. All the dreams you dreamed on that burning sands have been preserved into an hourglass. Every grain of sand is a dream, every grain of sand is a memory. They are still burning as the tears that now you’re shedding. Look at the night sky: all the stars shine into your glassy eyes, even those that are dead long ago. Look at the sand which is running into the hourglass: all the dreams and all the memories run, forever. Even the memories you have forgotten. Even the dreams you haven’t dreamed yet. Nothing is dead, nothing is lost if you entrust yourself to Melancholy. She will always turn the hourglass: your dreams will be transmuted into memories, your memories into dreams. Coming into the world you will shed the tears of a child who has dreams only, then the tears of anyone that feels the sensation of having memories only. And you will know that your tears are pearls of a shipwrecked treasure which is about to emerge again from the Ocean, your treasure. Sooner or later you will succeed in gaining it, and perhaps sooner or later I will succeed in gaining mine. Meanwhile let’s hope that Melancholy with a flap of her wings would sooth the burning of our tears, that the Ocean breeze would kiss us.