Story of the Month: The Red Mulberry, "A Greek Legend"

... In all Babylon there was none more beautiful than she.
She was the enchantment of the people of Babylon; the gods had sent her down to earth as the most perfect and most wondrous of all the gods' sendings.. She was lovelier than the rose...
Her breath was sweeter than the breath of violets...
And her mouth was like a cup of red wine...
And he was the handsomest and strongest of the youth of Babylon..
Beautiful as a god...
And strong as the lion of the forest..

They lived in two adjoining houses; he saw her and she saw him, from their earliest childhood.
Together they climbed the trees of the forest, and hid in the thickets, and swam in the nearby spring.

And "Thisbe" loved the fruit of the white mulberry — the red mulberry was not yet known — so "Pyramus" would climb the mulberry trees and shake them, and the delicious fruit would fall onto the green grass, and they would laugh together...

And they grew, with the trees of the forest, as though in the forest they were themselves trees — two firm-rooted cedars, watched over by the light and the dew, the night and the moon and the birds...

And they knew that it was love... this thing that troubles and torments, this thing whose taste is sweet in the mouth, like an intoxication, and this thing that turns the heart bitter as though a knife were in it...

And they knew sleeplessness and tears... on the moonlit nights, and the dark nights..
They knew that it was love, this thing that bound them together with a fine, hidden, wondrous thread...
And if it was not love?

Then what was it?
What is this ceaseless throbbing?
What is this unending longing...
Why does he see her as the most radiant thing in his life...
And why does she see him as the most radiant thing in her life...
Yes — it is love...

And "Pyramus" went to speak to his father about this love, and "Thisbe" spoke to her father...
And behold, the two fathers refused, and were haughty...
The devils of evil multiplied between them and enmity took root; they turned against one another and quarreled... But the quarrel could not overcome this love; it blazed the hotter and grew the more passionate...

"Pyramus" thought of nothing but his beloved; he began to compose verses about her and to send forth his song, telling the birds and the trees, the moon and the stars, of his love, and imploring the gods — and the gods were moved to pity — while she wept through her nights, beseeching the gods of mercy and love to reach the two of them with their compassion...

And the gods commanded... and the earth quaked with its quaking...
Now the room in which "Pyramus" slept adjoined the room in which "Thisbe" slept, separated by a wall common to the two houses.
The earthquake opened a crack fine as a hair, so that the air of the two rooms met... And "Pyramus's" singing began to steal into his beloved's room, and the sobbing of her tears to steal into his...
And through this crack the two lovers sent their complaint and their longing.

— Thisbe, Thisbe!
— Who? Who calls me?
— Thisbe, it is I... I, Pyramus.
— From where does your voice come?
— From here. Did you not feel the earthquake?
— Yes, it happened last night.
— It opened a crack in the wall..
And I am speaking to you through it.
— Pyramus...
— Thisbe.
— I pour out my heart at your feet through this crack!
— And I pour out my tears for your sake. How cruel this wall is — if only I could tear it down...
— And yet it is more merciful than our fathers.
— Pyramus —
— My life.
— Is Paradise more beautiful than our prison?
— It is beautiful — more beautiful than Paradise.
— And this darkness around us?
— The light of your love illumines it.
— I love to hear your singing, Pyramus,

through this wall... Sing, as the sun sends its rays upon the lifeless earth.
Sing, as the dew comes down upon the thirsty earth.

— Nothing is dearer to me than that..
— Sing...
— I shall sing..
— And what will you sing?
— All my songs that I have chanted for you.
I shall sing, for you, the spring and its blossoms,
and all the red roses that are in the gardens...
— Will you not sing something else?
— I shall sing to the gods, for they have graced me with your love.

The talk of the two tormented lovers went on and on through the wall.. But they could not endure this state, for love bore down upon them.
And on a certain night this conversation passed between the two lovers:

— Thisbe.
— Pyramus —
— The moon is almost at the full, my beloved.

— The moon is beautiful tonight.
— The moon is always beautiful...
— But it is silent... why is it mute..
— Do not say that, my beloved; Diana may hear you and be angered.

— Does it speak? Does it understand?
— It does not speak as we do, my beloved. It speaks with a tongue of silver — a tongue with a sweet, deep ring...

— That is a poet's fancy...
— No, it is the truth, my beloved.

— It speaks to me.. and understands me, and I speak to it and understand it...

It speaks to me with its rays and its lights, and I speak to it with my heart and my song... It has laughed for me, and it has danced for me... Thisbe!
— What is it, my beloved?
— I have a wish...
— What?

— I wish the moon's rays might flood over us tomorrow, on that open plain!
— Tomorrow!
— And why not.. do you not desire it?
— How could I refuse.. I wish it.
— Then we shall meet.
— And how —

— At night... you will come to me; no one will notice you.

— And where shall we meet?
— In the graveyard...
— ...??

— Do you not know it?
— A dreadful place. I fear the night...
— But it is a wonderful place...

We shall sit with the moon and talk...
— And you will sing?
— And we may weep...
— ...?

— Tomorrow, Thisbe.
— Tomorrow, my beloved.
— I shall wait for you by the white mulberry tree..

How wonderful the night is...

How wonderful this fragrance rising from earth and sky.. as if it were incense burned by the gods for the coming of "Thisbe," on her way to the beloved tryst. She walked as though borne upon a cloud... like a dream walking in mist...

She reached the dreadful graveyard... Here is the white mulberry tree.. a tree she knows well...

And here is the graveyard's marble — white, gleaming, majestic... and here is the moon, its rays dancing over the clean white marble, and the shadows stretching long — stretching as though they were the demons of the night.

But where is "Pyramus"?..
Where is her beloved Pyramus?
Why is Pyramus late for the tryst?
Then she heard a soft rustling... here he comes...
Then the rustling slowed.. then ceased... She peered into the depths of the silent, dreadful night... and saw nothing... Are these the demons of the night creeping toward her... But she will not be afraid.. for

When Thisbe's terror had subsided, she stood panting.. and it seemed to her that she heard in the night a beloved call coming to her through the thickets... She did not doubt that this voice was Pyramus's voice... and she feared for him because of the lioness... so she hurried toward him to warn him of the presence of that ravening beast — and she saw.. oh, the horror of what she saw... in the moonlight, beneath the white mulberry tree, a body lying at the edge of the spring.

— Pyramus... what is this... the sword in your breast.. why, my beloved.. And she bent over him, and there in his hand was her veil, gripped in his clenched fingers..

And she understood... she understood everything...

— Thisbe...

The slain man sent forth this call as he was dying.. and he opened his eyes and smiled... then closed them forever...

And she cried aloud.. and no one heard her in that night but the moon... and the moon still let fall its yellow rays upon the marble of the graves through the gray clouds..

How cruel you are, O moon, who witnessed my beloved's death...

But no... it is I who destroyed her... the moon bears no guilt...

And the youth braced himself and cast his gaze upon everything around him, to see all that "Thisbe" had seen before she died... then.... he sheathed his sword in his breast..

And the poor girl drew the sword from her beloved's breast, and as she was raising her eyes upward.. the sword in her hand.. she saw that the fruit of the white mulberry had all turned to red fruit, like drops of blood...

And the sword slept between her ribs...

In the morning... they raised for the two lovers a tomb of marble at the edge of the spring.. beneath the red mulberry tree...

An adaptation by "The Woman's Voice"