The Sky Over Lima by Juan Gómez Bárcena Page A

ongoing discussion of whether or not all things have a soul (they do, he says) and what those souls might consist of (perhaps this is what philosophers call
essence
?). The only new development is that accompanying these letters are the drafts of several poems. They are from Juan Ramón’s new book, to be titled
Distant Gardens
, which will appear next year. But of course the poems do not make a single reference to Georgina. Instead, they include an endless number of twilights and gardens—uninhabited paradises that seem to draw farther away before their eyes or were perhaps always far away, as if they could be contemplated only from the other side of a wrought-iron fence. And there’s not all that much to look at in those paradises either. Trees that glumly drop their leaves to the ground. Inconsequential rains, falling on those same trees. Boredom.
    Yet José refuses to give up. He cannot believe that Juan Ramón hasn’t written a poem to Georgina by now. There has to be one, or maybe even many—hundreds of verses hidden away somewhere. That’s what José needs to believe, anyway, as it’s been weeks since he’s written anything himself. He just sits at his desk and stares at his portrait of the Maestro. If only he could address him as a young poet in need of advice and not as a prim young lady in a skirt and bodice! He would ask him so many things. Indeed, he asks them every night, staring at the black-and-white image, at the portrait’s vacant eyes. He asks when Juan Ramón discovered he was a poet, how he was sure he had the talent for it. Whether there’s any reason for José to keep sitting there, hunched over his desk, scribbling out drafts that will never astound a critic or bring a lady to tears. Or maybe they will? At least tell me that much, Maestro: Am I already a genius, unawares? Should I persevere in my passion or accept my failure once and for all? But the Maestro does not answer, and so José does not write.
    That may be why he’s become convinced that Carlos has been right all along. That there is a particular dignity, a solemn, almost sacred dedication, in the act of creating a muse so that a great poet can craft his finest metaphors. And while he waits for those sublime pages, José busies himself reading and rereading the Maestro’s poems, finding the mark of Georgina hidden everywhere.
    â€œListen to this, Carlota!” he exclaims, waving Juan Ramón’s letter in the air. “
And suddenly, a voice / melancholy and distant, / has trembled across the water / in the silence of the air. / It is the voice of a woman / and of a piano, it is a soft / comfort for the roses / somnolent in the afternoon, / a voice that makes me / weep for nobody and for somebody / in this sad and golden / opulence of the parks.
It must be Georgina! It’s so clear: there’s a voice because of the letters, which come from very far away but nevertheless speak to him . . . And because he doesn’t know her yet, he weeps for nobody and for somebody . . . Don’t you see? For nobody and for somebody! It’s quite clear!”
    Carlos doesn’t say anything. He keeps looking down at the square from on high, as if there were something to decipher there. Darkness is falling. Soon there won’t be enough light for José to keep reading him the poems.
    â€œI think I’m going to go see him again,” he says suddenly, as if setting down a burden.
    â€œWho?”
    â€œThe Professor . . . if that’s all right with you.”
    José looks up from his papers.
    â€œProfessor Cristóbal? What for?”
    â€œI don’t know . . . It’s just a thought.”
    José hesitates for a moment. Then he shrugs.
    â€œWhatever you like. As long as I don’t have to go with you.”
    He doesn’t say anything else. But a few moments later, Carlos hears him muttering other lines with the