From My Mother's Soul

Have you heard, my heart, what has happened?
She fell asleep as the roses sleep; she closed her eyelids upon the dreams of her youth, then went away..
Have you heard all this, my heart?
Cursed, then — cursed! Were you not, my heart, in your very being, an image of my mother's heart?
Did I not know you to beat just as her heart beat? To knock in my breast in the same instant you knocked in hers? And did not the ailment that came again and again upon her heart pass over you too?
Why then do I see you, my heart, continuing your course in my breast, while my mother's heart has fallen silent in her breast, has stopped and stilled forever — my heart, forever?
But come, do not stop... beat in my ribs as you will; for my mother wanted life for me — shall I refuse anything my mother wanted?
Beat, heart, within my sides... and let me see life alone — frightening, desolate, misleading... No tender breast will hold me now, when my soul trembles with fear... no hand will reach me gently, when loneliness creeps through the darkness of my soul... no loving counsel will guide me, when I stumble on the road of my tomorrow amid error and evil and darkness.
Beat, heart, in my breast... and let me live to see the shreds of my hope... Who will plant flowers in my tomorrow? Who will light for me the torch of my day, each time I put it out with the gloom of my soul, and the tears of my eyes, and the revolt of all my being!..
Beat, my heart, beat... and lengthen my life as you will. Do you know the serenity that used to flood you with pride, when my mother's eyes looked upon you? Or will there ever pass over you a smile like the smiles of the angels, like those my mother's lips used to bestow upon you? Or do you perhaps hope that in all existence there is anyone who can bring you one word of the tenderness my mother gave?
Beat, heart, do not stop... and let me share with the spring its sorrows for my mother; its white roses have grown up in the meadows of all the earth, but they have remained ugly.. listless.. stagnant. Who can adorn the roses like my mother's face?
And the poor grass has leafed on all the banks, but it has remained thin.. still.. weary... Who can caress the grasses like my mother's fingertips?
Beat, my heart, beat... and let me imagine my mother in her heights, having taken from the houris of heaven three daughters to console her loneliness and cheer her solitude, to make her laugh and to play with her.. as we used to do with her: my sisters and I. Let me see the eldest of them play the lyre for her, and the second before her, making her laugh and keeping her company, and the third dancing for her the dances of heaven.. for she cannot endure solitude.
And she loves company and joy.. and she is young — she will flood heaven with the joy of her youth.
Beat, my heart... and let me see the ruin of my dreams with the eyes of my soul; let me imagine myself combing my mother's black hair, and dreaming of the locks of her head turned white, adorned by beautiful gray, the years glinting where it parts... for her death in her youth will keep gnawing at my heart until the day I meet her...
So beat, my heart, beat... and let me see my mother's grave before my eyes, and picture her form laid out in the depths of the earth — and she is there... knowing nothing of the coming of spring, nor of the waning of winter, nor of the arrival of summer, nor of the approach of autumn.. knowing neither morning nor evening.. and she is there, feeling nothing of our deep sorrow, knowing nothing of the tightening of our hearts, which quiver with the anguish of her memory!!!