Thoughts for this weekend

There’s no vocabulary
For love within a family,
love that’s lived in
But not looked at,
love within which
All else is seen,
the love within which
All other love finds speech.
This love is silent.

T.S.Eliot

The parrot at midnight: A short story by Kate DiCamillo

ONCE, IN A VILLAGE far away, there lived a boy who fell in love with a girl who, he believed, could never be his. So, heavy hearted, this boy, whose name was Carlos, left home. He went to sea and spent his life as a sailor. It was not until he was a very old man that he returned to the village of his youth.

Before his journey home, Carlos made a great and foolish purchase. The old man acquired a parrot of brilliant plumage from a vendor in a marketplace in Sudan.

"This parrot," the merchant said, "is in possession of an ancient secret. If you are patient and true, he will speak the secret aloud one day."

On the long voyage home, the parrot spoke not a single word. And when Carlos returned to the village of his youth, he discovered that the girl whom he had loved when he was young, Lena, was now, of course, very old. Worse, he was astonished and dismayed to discover that his heart, which he thought had long since been tamed, leapt up in his chest like a wild thing each time Lena appeared before him. When Carlos saw her on the street or in a café, he removed his hat and bowed deeply to her to hide his agitation and disbelief. He bowed so deeply that he missed, altogether, the look of love and yearning on her face.

The parrot, who had taken up permanent residence on the old sailor's shoulder, watched all of these doings with a jaded and critical eye.

Sometimes, Carlos would wake from a deep sleep to find the parrot perched at the foot of his bed, staring at him, his head cocked as if he were considering something profound.

"Tell me," said the old man, "please."

The parrot moved his beak as if to speak; but, finally, deep in the dead of night, he would refuse to utter any word at all.

To fill the silence of these lonely nights, the old man began to speak of the things he had seen as he sailed about the world: diamond-scaled sea monsters and angels of light, golden moons and thousands of fish leaping from the water at once. Always, he ended each of his stories with a shrug and these words: "But what does it matter when Carlos could never tell Lena that he loved her, has always loved her?"

In the village, it was a tradition each Christmas to hold a midnight service complete with a splendid Nativity scene. The humblest animals were led down the aisle one by one to gather around the manger and admire the Christ child.

On Christmas night, Carlos went to church with the parrot atop his shoulder. He sat in the back and watched as a reluctant sheep was led down the aisle. The sheep was followed by a goat in high spirits, who kicked up his heels in a merry way. After this came a mournful donkey, his head hung low. The parrot, watching this clumsy procession, became visibly agitated, shuffling from foot to foot and flapping his wings.

When the church bells rang out at midnight, the parrot gave a startled squawk and burst into flight. He circled around the manger scene and then flew up high and perched on a rafter.

"Come down at once," Carlos called to the parrot.

The parrot spread his wings. And then, with the attention of all the church focused on him, the parrot spoke clearly. He said, "But what does it matter when Carlos could never tell Lena that he loved her, has always loved her?"

Lena stood slowly. She cast a trembling, light-filled look around the church and then she stepped from her pew and walked down the aisle to where Carlos stood. She took his hand in hers.

The donkey brayed.

And the parrot, as if in a dream, floated down from the rafters and landed, again, on the old man's shoulder.

"There," said Carlos, to the parrot, to Lena, to the world, "there. There."

"Yes," said Lena, "there."

The parrot said nothing.

In fact, he never again, for the rest of his long life, said a word, although he often stood at the foot of the bed Carlos and Lena shared, his head cocked, his beak closed, gazing at them in wonder and satisfaction as they slept.


Jonathan Safran Foer from Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

The hairs of our arms touched.
It was late, and we were tired.
We assumed there would be other nights . . .
I said, I want to tell you something.
She said, You can tell me tomorrow.
I had never told her how much I loved her . . .
I thought about waking her.
But it was unnecessary.
There would be other nights.
And how can you say I love you to someone you love?
I rolled onto my side and fell asleep next to her.
Here is the point of everything I have been trying to tell you, Oskar.
It’s always necessary.