MARINA
TSVETAEVA
195
heat upstairs." For the children, Mademoiselle coming for the tree
eclipses the tree itself. Oust as for angels who wait to receive a
righteous man who knows not what awaits him, heaven is eclipsed
by his coming.)
"She should be here any minute. It's ten of? Oh, another
whole ten minutes."
"She should be here now . What time is it? She's never late. "
"Maybe she only got back today, and that's why she's a bit
late? Are you absolutely sure (the children to each other) that the
first lesson is today?" "She said the 5th." "But the 5th was yester–
day, why didn't she come yesterday? She told me Thursday." "She
told me the 5th . But today's Thursday and so she'll be coming any
minute now."
Only her two gifts remained under the tree .
• • •
The days came and went, Mademoiselle didn't. At first this
alarmed everyone, then we got used to-alarm. The nonarrival of
Mademoiselle, and she didn't arrive time after time, gradually
became the refrain of the day for all the inhabitants of the house,
small and large . That is, it became a thing which gradually lost its
content from one time to the next. (The independent life of a refrain,
outside of its significance.) Just as at the beginning we were sur–
prised at Mademoiselle's not coming, now we would have been just
as surprised-had she come. Surprise simply shifted from the point
of departure to the point of application. It was surprising
from over
there.
(Thus, Rainer, just as we were surprised that such a man could
live, now-that he could die.)
People aren't very attentive to verb forms-font du sort sans Ie
savoir. From the personal first-second-third counted times that
"Mademoiselle didn't come" to the chronic, "Mademoiselle
doesn't come anymore," what a road and what work. Mademoiselle
just took up residence in the absence into which she had (for us) ac–
cidentally fallen. There was not a lunch or dinner where one of the
adults or children, between courses, with a tone of already sedimen–
tary surprise, did not state-"Mademoiselle hasn't come." And im–
mediately-as if that was all we'd been waiting for, in unison along
the beaten track of echo: Maybe she's sick? But she would have writ–
ten. Maybe her sister is sick? But she would have written in that case
too. Maybe she's so alone that there's no one to help her write? But
then there wouldn't be anyone to wait on her either. Maybe ....
