“You may not be different” I once was told, “but you
can act differently.”
And I did. When facing my computer screen for endless
hours on a rainy day, I reminded myself that what I write has to be different
if it has to reflect my excitement about the ordinary. When working in my
darkroom developing meters and meters of film, I smiled thinking that all
around me were using digital cameras. And, when assuming my role of an academic
around the world, I never gave the same lecture twice, for I wanted to surprise
myself.
… It is raining, it is spring, and the swallows’
eggs have already hatched. From dawn to dusk, I listen to the incessant request
of those open mouths for worms. For a
week or two, the dozens of swallow nests around my balcony will be my philharmonic
orchestra, my comfort with the daily low and high tides of the Atlantic Ocean, also
under my balcony.
Last night, when the swallow chicks were sleeping, I
listened to Fado while reading about the history of this genre of lament. Like any style of expression, Fado started as
an unstructured method of sad and lamenting singing. It did reflect the poverty
and misery of the Portuguese populous. That’s why it was not adopted by the
aristocratic circles until Maria Severa, a fadista and of that warm Portuguese
blood full the veins, had a romance with the Count of Vimioso in the first half
of the 19th century. Fado thus became chic and jerked tears from aristocratic
lacrimal glands as abundantly as from those of the working people. A romance, a song, and Fado defined a people.
Maria Severa died at the age of 26, and since then,
female fadistas wear a black shawl in memory of her and in response to the
pains of life. A fadista, in a dimly lit Fado tavern, will move only her hands
and with her voice and facial expressions, tell you how lucky you are to not be
broken by love.
Or how unlucky you are.
… I have had the fortune of seeing and hearing Amália Rodrigues, the “Queen of Fado” (Rainha do Fado), decades ago when on tour in Beirut. Since then I have left dreams and ample tears
in taverns all over Portugal. Here are a few lines from a poem I wrote in 2006:
Shadows
could not
Cover
the burning pain
A
guitarra, a viola and an impossible desire
Hugged
in silence, as if a dance
At
the Carnival
Where
six double strings
Gave
fate a name
Gave
the sea its darkness
A
night away from Mouraria
The
wine, color of passion
Color
of dark pain
The
candle, color of remembrance
Flickered
as the last embrace
Partir e Morrer Um Pouco
But
to stay is to play with fate
With
the color of that wine
Color
of passion
Color
of a promise
Color
of rain
Upon
the Castello
Atop
the city
Which ended:
…In
the streets of Old Lisbon
A
poet found his lost song
But
it was sung by another
Who
thought it was
A
new song….
Indeed, Fado
(Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈfaðu], "destiny,
fate”,
has its epistemological origin in the Latin word fatum, but the
poetry represents longing more than fate. It is the longing for what we have
lost, for what we never had.
But for me, it is the longing
for what we have lost but perhaps never had!
For me, Fado is the reminder that we are born with things already lost
to us, rather than losing these because of life.
… Last
night, when the swallows’ chicks were sleeping, I listened to Mariza, the diva
of the new generation of Fado, sing the famous lines of Amália Rodrigues
“Com
que voz chorarei meu triste fado
(with what voice should I lament my sad fate/sing my sad fado?”
May 22, 2014
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2014
About the picture:
I took this one in New Orleans. It was a perfect contrast between the dark and
the bright, the “being different” and not so much so. As I was writing this
page, I thought of this picture but this time in a different way: instead of
the fadista in the black shawl and in the semi-dark tavern, this man, wearing a
tutu and not taking himself too seriously, reminded me that we may not be
different but we sure can act differently.
For those of you who have not seen a
fadista (at least through a 50 year old rangefinder camera lens!) check my page:
http://liveingray.blogspot.com/2013/04/lets-go-to-portugal.html
