only memories remained, and of the small dales, only legends from the old days that there was a time when foamy brooklets flowed through the dales and deer stooped to drink from their waters.
The villagers grew in number, the trees of the majestic forest became beams in haylofts, the haylofts burned down, the inhabitants found shelter in caves, and when the sun shone once again on the peaceful vaults, the villagers came out of the caves, wheat sprouted out of the soft ground, and the villagers once more began to multiply during the cold winter nights in their underground houses.
When the brooks began to dry up, the last vines were hewed, the mounds were leveled, and the winepresses became abandoned. Rain, snow, and wind came. The rain beat against the walls of the winepresses, and the winepresses got knocked to the ground and were leveled just like the mounds in the vineyards.
The winepresses, too, became only a memory, just like the seventh-century prince.
On the roof of St. John the Baptist Monastery, thorns began to grow, cracking the age-old cement and displacing the stones. And, during an earthquake, the dome collapsed and its stones fell into the Kasakh, foaming the river and filling it with the same stones that the villagers had lifted and carried on their backs centuries ago.
At the crack of dawn, old ladies kissed the charred stones in the monastery more passionately than before, while goats bleated and nimbly bounded over the fallen stones onto the roof of the monastery to chew on the shrubs that had grown through the cracks of the roof.
Years went by. The villagers held on to their native pasture very tightly. They curled up when they were beaten and retracted into their shells like snails do when their slimy tentacles touch something repulsive: the Khans soldiers, the synod’s taxes, the constable’s whip.
The villagers lived huddled together within the walls of St. John the Baptist Monastery, sowing wheat into the arid ground, eating pancakes made from the wheat, producing fertilizer from fodder and the waste of hidebound oxen, coating the stones on the Urartian walls with the fertilizer, and keeping jars of pickles in their pagan ancestors’ graves.
* * *
Last spring, when the snow was melting on the skirts of Mount Ara and its slopes were becoming exposed, and when the turbid snow water was flowing down in narrow streams toward the valley of the Kasakh, a villager from St. John the Baptist Monastery, whose ancestors had carried stones for the monastery in the seventh century, set his eye on a strip of ground inside the walls of the monastery.
The villager walked around the collapsed stones of the monastery, looked at the sacredly carved stones, and contemplated building a threshing floor and hayloft with the stones of the monastery and using the patch of land for a vegetable garden. And when he leaned over to see whether there was a road to fetch water from the valley with jugs for the thresher in the summer heat, it did not cross his mind that his seventh-century ancestor had stood on that same cliff wishing to see a vaulted monastery, and that the abbot had looked down on the turbid waves of the Kasakh from the same precipice and had missed the prince’s concubine, had missed her and had read psalms.
It was cool on the edge of the cliff—the cool breeze pleased the villager. The wind could easily blow away the threshed husks. And how wonderful it was that walls had been built around the monastery in the old days! The surrounding goats would not be able to enter and graze the herbs in the vegetable garden. Behind the walls, next to the threshing floor and hayloft, he would build a house on top of the precipice and live out of the sight of a neighbor’s gaze.
At home in the evening he fell to thinking once more. He weighed the wish he had had in the afternoon and found it good. He thought it imperative to start planting trees immediately on the next day, to dig the vegetable garden, and to hang
The villagers grew in number, the trees of the majestic forest became beams in haylofts, the haylofts burned down, the inhabitants found shelter in caves, and when the sun shone once again on the peaceful vaults, the villagers came out of the caves, wheat sprouted out of the soft ground, and the villagers once more began to multiply during the cold winter nights in their underground houses.
When the brooks began to dry up, the last vines were hewed, the mounds were leveled, and the winepresses became abandoned. Rain, snow, and wind came. The rain beat against the walls of the winepresses, and the winepresses got knocked to the ground and were leveled just like the mounds in the vineyards.
The winepresses, too, became only a memory, just like the seventh-century prince.
On the roof of St. John the Baptist Monastery, thorns began to grow, cracking the age-old cement and displacing the stones. And, during an earthquake, the dome collapsed and its stones fell into the Kasakh, foaming the river and filling it with the same stones that the villagers had lifted and carried on their backs centuries ago.
At the crack of dawn, old ladies kissed the charred stones in the monastery more passionately than before, while goats bleated and nimbly bounded over the fallen stones onto the roof of the monastery to chew on the shrubs that had grown through the cracks of the roof.
Years went by. The villagers held on to their native pasture very tightly. They curled up when they were beaten and retracted into their shells like snails do when their slimy tentacles touch something repulsive: the Khans soldiers, the synod’s taxes, the constable’s whip.
The villagers lived huddled together within the walls of St. John the Baptist Monastery, sowing wheat into the arid ground, eating pancakes made from the wheat, producing fertilizer from fodder and the waste of hidebound oxen, coating the stones on the Urartian walls with the fertilizer, and keeping jars of pickles in their pagan ancestors’ graves.
* * *
Last spring, when the snow was melting on the skirts of Mount Ara and its slopes were becoming exposed, and when the turbid snow water was flowing down in narrow streams toward the valley of the Kasakh, a villager from St. John the Baptist Monastery, whose ancestors had carried stones for the monastery in the seventh century, set his eye on a strip of ground inside the walls of the monastery.
The villager walked around the collapsed stones of the monastery, looked at the sacredly carved stones, and contemplated building a threshing floor and hayloft with the stones of the monastery and using the patch of land for a vegetable garden. And when he leaned over to see whether there was a road to fetch water from the valley with jugs for the thresher in the summer heat, it did not cross his mind that his seventh-century ancestor had stood on that same cliff wishing to see a vaulted monastery, and that the abbot had looked down on the turbid waves of the Kasakh from the same precipice and had missed the prince’s concubine, had missed her and had read psalms.
It was cool on the edge of the cliff—the cool breeze pleased the villager. The wind could easily blow away the threshed husks. And how wonderful it was that walls had been built around the monastery in the old days! The surrounding goats would not be able to enter and graze the herbs in the vegetable garden. Behind the walls, next to the threshing floor and hayloft, he would build a house on top of the precipice and live out of the sight of a neighbor’s gaze.
At home in the evening he fell to thinking once more. He weighed the wish he had had in the afternoon and found it good. He thought it imperative to start planting trees immediately on the next day, to dig the vegetable garden, and to hang
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