TE15 Lithuanian Honey Cake

Terribly in Love

MONUMENT It stood on the highest hill in the cemetery, to which from all sides led sandy paths. It stood prominently, evoking the respect and fascination of a Pantheon. The massive head of the sculpture stood above all the other memorials, though the statue had no hands — fulfilling the intention of the sculptor the whole body from the neck down is limbed with books, leaving no chance for the poor celebrity with his trembling fingers to unbutton a few buttons on the dress of the woman he loved or greedily lift to his lips the glass of rich red wine, not to mention any other pleasures of life. We didn’t know even the surname of the author for whom the monument had been built — it was written too high, and in the dusk that evening we didn’t bother to look through at it —much less the elegant passages engraved in the marble from texts in the French language. We did not know yet that the cemetery guard had locked the gates already, equalizing the living and the dead, and that we would lie on the cold unfamiliar stone, sharing it and the lone orange in our pockets and the remnants of warmth in our bodies, — so small and unknown to anyone — even the visitors sworn to the cemetery.

Translated by H. L. Hix and the author

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