Book of My Mother

XV

I DO NOT WANT her in dreams. I want her in life, here with me, well dressed, by her son and proud of being looked after by her son. She bore me for nine months and she is no longer here. I am a fruit without a tree, a chick without a hen, a lion cub all alone in the desert, and I am cold. If she were here, she would say, “Cry, my child, you’ll feel better after for it.” She is not here and I do not want to cry. I only want to cry by her side. I want to go for a walk with her and listen to her as no one else ever listened to her. I want to flatter her. I want to wheedle her into wasting time keeping me company while I shave or while I dress. I want — if Thou art God, prove it — I want to be ill and have her bring me her own remedies, roasted linseed ground and mixed with powdered sugar — “It’s good for coughs, my son.” I want her to brush my suits. I want her to tell me stories. I was put on earth to listen to my mother’s interminable stories. I want her partiality — I want her to be cross with those who do not like me. I want to show her my diplomatic passport, to see her delight, because she is convinced, my naïve darling, that it is important to have a diplomatic passport. I shall not disillusion her, because I want her to be pleased and to bless me. But I also want to be her little boy as I used to be. I want her to draw me her naïve flowers, which I shall try to copy. I want her to knot my tie and then give me a little pat on the cheek. I want to be Maman’s little boy — a very nice little boy who likes to hold the hem of his Maman’s skirt as she sits at his bedside when he is ill. When I am holding the hem of her skirt, no one can harm me. You think it is ridiculous to talk like this at my age? Then allow me to be ridiculous.

The little bird whose mother they have killed is ridiculous. Perched on its branch, it twitters a dirge, a monotonous and ineffectual tweet-tweet. That lamb is ridiculous too. It is bleating in the desert because it has lost its mother ewe. Trembling in the sand, it will soon die of thirst, but it is looking for its mother in the desert.

I want to hear her superstitiously advising me not to say certain dangerous words for three days after being vaccinated. I want to see her starched awkwardness when I introduce one of my friends to her. I want her to be here and to tell me, as she used to tell me, not to write too much, “because thinking like that all the time is bad for the head, and there are scholars, you know, my son, who have gone mad through thinking, and my mind is at rest when you’re asleep, because at least you’re not thinking when you’re asleep.” I say that I want, I ask, but I get nothing, and God loves me so little that I feel ashamed for Him.