"Gwyneth Jones - Flowerdust" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jones Gwyneth)

or small as a child at play amongst the waringins
This life of mine on earth is filled with toil
and strife, and my enemies who are many, mock me.
Their ridicule flies to its target swifter than
plumed arrows; their words strike deeper than
krisses. My struggle is not yet at an end.
And soon Thou wilt take me and I shall lie
amongst the others whose plays are over.
I shall be amongst the thousands in darkness.
And my struggle was not yet at an end:
Still my enemies dance.
Lord, let me be a wayang in Thy hands
Then after a hundred or a thousand years, Thy hand
will bestow upon me life and movement once more.
Then, one day when my time has come for Thy
eternity,
Thou wilt call me to Thee again, and I shall speak
and contend anew.
And one day my enemies will be silenced, and the
demon
 will lie prostrate on the ground.
Oh Lord, let me be a wayang in Thy hands
Noto Suroto,
Wayang Liederen
(translated from the
Dutch)




Flowerdust


1
^»
On a day of baking sunlight in the middle of the third month, a
small person in white clothes presented herself at the Cold Storage
building, on the causeway side of the city of Ranganar. The Butcher
volunteers recognized her and let her in as soon as she asked. The
cat, Divine Endurance, slipped under the gate. She never felt the
need to ask permission to do anything.
Inside the building it was stuffy and dim. Harassed young
Samsui hurried about, the sleeves of their blue cotton jackets rolled
and trousers tucked up to the knee for coolness. Their rosy, earnest
faces were crumpled with worry. The Koperasi had made a delivery
of supplies yesterday. The men were being very generous. No one
knew where this food came from; but there was heaps of it, and not
in good condition. The Kops had simply driven their treader into the
yard and dumped its contents, in no kind of order. It was a struggle
merely to sort out the perishable from the nonperishable—and by