Strange to say, although we spirits smile wryly as we talk of our mistakes, resentments, clashes, and conflicts of yore, most of us up here would still like to go back, even if for only a brief time. Some can’t wait to denounce their murderers, others want to leak state secrets or to elucidate mysteries they took with them to the grave, but for most of us, it’s plain nostalgia. Of course, our desire to see our nearest and dearest is also shot through with the wish to tell but the tiniest part of the wonders we have seen from this side.
Every ten or fifteen thousand years the rumor goes round that home visits are going to be allowed. The great mass of ghosts then starts to hurry toward the Wall But then we see it looming before us, a great sinister mass in the darkness of the night. The lookouts are blind, so it is said. Crossings happen in one direction only, from there to here . . . never from here to there.
Buoyed by the whisper that one day there will be two-way travel through the Wall, we carry on hoping all the same. Some cannot hold back their tears. They claim they’ve been expected for all eternity by beings who are dear to them, or by temples where they would try to pour balm on wounded minds, or even by whole nations that are dying to see them return. They say they have invitations, which they wave like banners from afar, certificates from people who say they’re prepared to give them board and lodging and who will even stand surety for their safe return. They parade academic insignia topped by royal crowns, and other sacred stamps, occasionally of dubious origin. But the gates never open, not for anyone.
Spirits get angry, start to protest, and make a racket that can be heard at the top of the watchtowers. They yell that it’s the same old story as on earth, that nothing has changed, that it’s just as strict, just as inhuman . . .
Since it is another case of crossing a boundary, we who have experience of walls and other kinds of barriers cherish the hope that we may be granted special favor. Sometimes we get together among ourselves: some show off the scars from the spears and bullets that went through them, others show the tears made in their skin by barbed wire, or the holes made in their chests by the tips of embassy railings. We imagine those wounds will suffice to soften the hearts of the guardians of the gate. But we soon realize those are just vain hopes and that no one will be granted a laissez-passer.
When the others see how we are being treated, they lose all hope. Small, defeated groups straggle away, reckoning that the laws will be relaxed one fine day, and they start to listen out once again for a new rumor to cheer them up.
Last time, in the waiting crowd, someone pointed out a fellow called Jesus Christ . . . They’ve been making every imaginable special case for him for all eternity, they even sing hymns in his honor. What’s more, his emblem shining from the roofs of cathedrals shows that of us all over here, he is certainly the one most expected back on earth.
As a matter of fact, even he is not optimistic. He comes and goes at the base of the Wall, displaying from afar the marks of the nails with which they crucified him, but the guardians pretend not to see them. Unless, as we have long suspected, the guardians are truly eyeless.
Paris, Winter 1993
Ismail Kadare, Agamemnon's Daughter
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