(Coming from six barrels of steel filled with water and from one of the donkeys). A deep voice, such as that of Jamelão or Mrs. Inah, singing, with long intervals, the first four verses of the song “If all were just like you”, by Jobim and Vinicius. At times, the entire stanza, at others, one sole verse, or fragment of a verse, like someone aloof, singing listlessly, sometimes mistaking the lyrics).
Watch it go, your life, your path is peace and love
Watch it go, your life is a beautiful love song
Open your arms and sing one last hope
The divine hope of loving in peace.
(Coming from the salt hill and from one of the donkeys. A masculine voice, commenting on the lyrics):
(Yelling, hoarsely) Watch it go! Go!
(Long pause)
Watch it go, your path.
It’s not you who goes, it’s your path. Where are you going, if it’s your path that goes?
If the goer goes alone?
(Pause) Alone.
(Long pause)
Your life goes, it’s going, watch it go.
It goes without you, it’s going alone, it’s going regardless, whether you want it or not. (Yelling) Watch it go!, go!, go! (pause) with no one in it, no one in there. (Yelling) Go! (Pause, yelling). I won’t go! Lightly it goes, hollow, weightless, like empty packaging. And it’s going fine, thanks, flowing, it’s going. Now. It’s going now. Right under your nose. A few steps ahead of you, your life is pulling you. Whether you want it or not. Your life on parade. In your face. Glorious, half-naked. On the runway, on TV. It’s going. Your life (pause) thor-ough-ly victorious. Award-winning, launched in a public ceremony. Can you hear the applause? Even so, it’s your life. (Pause) It’s your life. (Pause) It’s yours. All yours, but it’s not you. (Pause) There it goes. (Yelling) Watch it go! Go! Look. (Pause) It’s your life, but it’s not you.
(Long pause)
(With some irony in the voice, singing)
“Open your arms.” It would be better to open your hands. Your hands for example. Drop what you’re gripping in your hand. Open your arms for what? Embrace what? The shining stone. The landscape. Embrace each gust of wind. (Screaming) Go! (Pause. Yelling). I won’t go! The city without you. Every street, every neighborhood goes without you. (Pause. Singing) “Open your arms” (Pause. Harsh) Your-ARM-S! Strong, weak, what, hairy? Here! Carry this. Carry it now. That’s what your arms are good for. Your arms carry the whole mound of salt away. Far away, grain by grain. Bit by bit. Far away from my eyes. Or all at once. As if it were the last time. You. You there. (Pause. Yelling) Go! (Pause) Go! (Pause) I won’t go! (Pause) Open your arms, that’s what they’re good for. You, you there. Yes, I know: I’ve already got salt on my face. I know I cry, that’s clear. The whole city goes on alone (normal voice) watch it go, go, go. Open your arms. Embrace (pause) each gust of wind. Before it passes, before its echo passes, before the gust stops, the sequence of gusts, embrace. Before it turns to what? - confetti, streamers, and then turns to what? - news, TV newscast, and then even what?, paper, before it turns to into a page of newsprint covering what?, covering what? - (responding coldly) covering the body thrown to the sidewalk by the same gust of wind. Ex-act-ly. Yes, that's so, and so forth. So it goes. It continues, with or without you, like it or not. That thing wants to keep going. Keep going always. That thing there wants to keep going. Look. Your life. (Pause, hesitating voice), that thing. That thing there. Better that way. (Pause) Embrace everything you can.
(Long pause)
(Singing) "And it sings." It sings how? That one’s already singing. (Humming) "One last hope..." I always had hope. No one can say anything about that, I always had a lot. The salt running down my face isn't — no, not despair, ever. Salt dehydrates, preserves. Mummifies each gust of wind. I myself distill and save it. I accumulate it slowly. Does it sing low, or does it sing loud? Does it sing all sweet, or does it sing in shrieks? Does it sing for, or does it sing against? Who sings? Who does it sing for? (Pause. Yelling) Watch it go! (Pause) Salt preserves the voice in the air. (Pause) Immobile. Quite still. The voice, waiting. Salt preserves the still light. Quiet, there, you can see. The ancient light and the voice, both there, all still. Waiting. The salt keeps the audience in place, its own place, on the outside, silent, also still. Totally inert. (Astonished tone, like someone completing a logical thought) Mummified. Like a statue of... guess? Guess, of what? I know! A statue of salt, you idiot. (Yelling) Salt!
Graze, (Pause) go on. The hay flies off when it’s windy. It scatters like live ashes. Ashes, but alive. It enters the digestive tract (pause) and turns into (emphasis) green dung. Host. It grows inside. Peaceful animals traversed by (Pause. Loudly) hay! Sunflower! Roses! Geraniums! Scream, green. Scream, everything. Everything's green (Emphasis) Peace! (Emphasis) On Earth! (Emphasis) No one! Let the pause, the pause between them—them: the hay eaters— (Pause) let the pause grow until they lose their rhythm. Let the pause take over these beings that are (Pause) stunted, centered, let even their rhythm, which kills everything, everything, die, in its turn, die. Even their rhythm, (Pause) which kills everything, everything (Pronouncing slowly)—the tree-s, the an-i-mals, the ros-es, the lit-tle pleas-ures, the dai-ly re-joic-ing (Pause), die, in its turn, die. It wouldn’t know how to ask for more. It wouldn’t be able to want more. It wouldn’t be able to dream of anything else — little mound of resting hay, the base bigger than the tip, blown to the wind, blown at times, blown at random. A mountain that walks like someone walks, an aimless drifter, a portless ship, a stray dog, lost. A landscape dawning every day inside another landscape. A dissipated mound. (Pause, yelling) Watch it go! Scattered. (Pause, yelling) Go! Mixing with the elements. (Pause, yelling) Go! It couldn’t know more. It couldn’t want more. (Pause, yelling) Go! Enough. (Pause, yelling) Go! (Pause, yelling)
Go! (Pause, yelling) Go! Enough. (Pause, yelling) Go! (Pause, yelling) Go!
Translation by Marlène Ramírez Cancio