Death at Golgotha-4th part

Novel published in Serbian as “Smrt na Golgoti”, Prosveta 1965, © Borislav Pekic, English translation © by Lovett F. Edwards

for the 5th part HERE

Then why did you then bear the cross, why did you run

I didn’t run

you did run you were scared that the cross and redemption might pass you by

but the procession by great good luck

what lousy luck

got jammed in the Gate of Justice in the middle of the north wall like a divine seal on the last page of history of the history of sin as a sign of the ultimate end as a prophetic mark which will never be moved forward or backward nor will it ever be erased

the spit if Israel what brand and sign and seal’s that

the mob red blue yellow white green black amid the merry-go-round of color only one man bewildered and caught in the act like a child

was it you that has been bewildered and caught like a child

but who’ll be able to tell us apart when all the differences are wiped away and cancelled among us and when I hang here for both

you hang for God and you hang for man

I hang for myself in place of God and in place of man

it’s hard for me and what would be if I had to bear the world as I bore the cross knowing what no one knew and fulfilling what no one was asked to fulfill

if I’d known all the time how I’d end how I’d die if I’d known this pain this thundering in my limbs and the dry lightning in my eyeballs

but that cross wasn’t mine


I knew nothing and wasn’t heavy for me and simply didn’t belong to me just as the burden the bearer carries for a master doesn’t belong to him

I had to lug it along as far as Golgotha and to carry it and that for me was all its weight and torment

though Temna will never forgive me for running away from her bed

one must think clearly

since crosses are also men’s beds and God’s beds

let’ go pull haul carry and all in a rush although his death

is my death

already prepared and the spit and the hare embracing one another

what am I here then and who am I here then

look I bear the cross with no effort and it doesn’t matter that the longer crossbar which has slipped from my shoulder drags across the cobbles and splinters since it will be a fine thick cross anyway for a fine thick torture from which future generations will grow fat

and I peek between the longer and the shorter arm of the cross past his shoulder and see his thin hairy legs disappearing among many strange legs

and there were so very many oh God

in strange clothing red yellow blue white green black...

At six o’clock the skies grew grey as the belly of a sick man and he thought: perhaps my God is coming with a belly dark with anger. But instead night fell.

... with strange unstable voices and strange mercies until I lost sight of him as he wiped his wiped his sweaty face with our neighbor Veronica’s scarf

so Temna my little dove it was too late to throw off the cross it weighed me down as if it were my own and made to my measure

how it hurts how it hurts

but I’ll think clearly and with dignity

about what since there’s no way back and my God’s nowhere

there’s a lovely bower the roof of my house and the red tiles over you and you dream in the cool bed sheets and the moan is so near your windows that you can touch it your little finger dipped in wine and offer it to the moan to lick

o God o God why have you forsaken me

come on plug along pull carry for you have arrived in time after a whole life of searching in time to meet with God with truth and with you who are the most important truth

and all this years do you know what it means all this years will remain empty like shallow footsteps in quicksand...

At seven o’clock he heard breathing which couldn’t have come from his companions. Perhaps my God of Hosts is returning, he thought, distraught by the murmur of the onlookers under the cross. Instead of God, a wind blew from the hill of Zion and refreshed him enough to feel all the pain which his uncomfortable situation required.

for the 5th part HERE