Ali Smith

Bonjour, dit-il. Tu lis quoi ? Elisabeth lui montra ses mains vides. Je donne l’impression d’être en train de lire ? dit-elle. Il faut toujours être en train de lire, dit-il. Même quand on ne lit pas réellement. Sinon, comment lirions-nous le monde ?

Definitely tell the lie, Elisabeth said.
But think what will happen if I do, Danied said.
It will be brilliant, Elisabeth said. It'll be really funny.
I'll tell you what will happen, Daniel said. This. You and I will know I've lied, but your mother won't. You and I will know something that your mother doesn't. That will make us feel different towards not just your mother, but each other. A wedge will come between us all. You will stop trusting me, and quite right, because I'd be a liar. We'll all be lessened by the lie. So. Do you still choose the ballet ? Or will I tell the sorrier truth ?
I want the lie, Elisabeth said. She knows loads of things I don't. I want to know some things she doesn't.
The power of the lie, Daniel said. Always seductive to the powerless. But how is my being a retired dancer going to help in any real way with your feelings of powerlessness ?
Were you a dancer ? Elisabeth said.
Thats's my secret, Daniel said. I'll never divulge. Not to any human being. Not for any money.

If he was very old, the neighbour, he didn't look anything like the people who were meant to be it on TV, who always seemed as if they were trapped inside a rubber mask, not just a face-sized mask, but one that went the length of the body from head to foot, and if you could tear it off or split it open it was like you'd find an untouched unchanged young person inside, who'd simply step cleanly out of the old fake skin, like the skin after you take out the inner banana. When they were trapped inside that skin, though, the eyes of people, at least the people in all the films and comedy programmes, looked desperate, like they were trying to signal to outsiders without giving the game away that they'd been captured by empty aged selves which were now keeping them alive inside them for some sinister reason, like those wasps that lay eggs inside other creatures so their hatchlings will have something to eat. Except the other way round, the old self feeding the young one. All that was left would be the eyes, pleading, trapped behind the eyeholes.

I'm tired of the news. I'm tired of the way it makes things spectacular that aren't, and deals so simplistically with what's truly appalling. I'm tired of the vitriol. I'm tired of the anger. I'm tired of of the meanness. I'm tired of the the selfishness. I'm tired of how we're doing nothing to stop it. I'm tired of how we're enouraging it. I'm tired of the violence there is and I'm tired of the violence that's on its way, that's coming, that hasn't happened yet. I'm tired of liars. I'm tired of sanctified liars. I'm tired of how those liars have let this happen. I'm tired of having to wonder whether they did it out of stupidity or did it on purpose. I'm tired of lying governments. I'm tired of people not caring whether they're being lied to any more. I'm tired of being made to feel this fearful. I'm tired of animosity. I'm tired of pusillanimosity.
I don't think it's actually a word, Elisabeth says.
I'm tired of not knowing the right words, her mother says.

She bears a fleeting ghost of a resemblance to that girl dancing with the phone box in the film back then ; the girl-ghost is a technicolor shimmer somewhere still about her person. Her older self is warm, bright like an apple still high up in a tree after all the others have been picked.

- J'ai presque eu le temps de lire un livre ici, ce matin, dit Elisabeth. Alors je me dis que ça serait une bonne idée de mettre des ouvrages à disposition des gens qui attendent afin qu'ils puissent lire s'ils le souhaitent. Avez-vous déjà songé à ouvrir ou installer une petite bibliothèque ?
- C'est drôle que vous parliez de ça, dit le type. Parce que la plupart des gens ici ne viennent pas là pour les services de la poste. La bibliothèque a fermé, alors quand il pleut ou quand le temps est trop moche, les gens se réfugient ici.

Il aurait cru que la mort épure une personne, la débarrasse de toute sa pourriture pourrissante jusqu’à lui donne l’inconsistance d’un nuage.

Ah, les jeux de mots : la richesse des pauvres ; ce pauvre vieux John Keats. Pauvre, certainement, mais vieux, non, ça jamais. Lui, le poète de l’automne dans une Italie d’hiver s’était surpris, à quelques jours de sa mort, à faire des jeux de mots comme s’il ne devait pas y avoir de lendemain…

Ensemble, tout prenait forme. Tout devenait possible.
Avant nous, j’ignorais que chaque veine de mon corps transportait la lumière, comme une rivière vue d’un train trace une ligne de ciel dans le paysage. J’ignorais que je pouvais être tellement plus que ce que j’étais. J’ignorais qu’un autre corps puisse me faire cet effet.

Parce que personne n'a la moindre idée de qui nous sommes et de qui nous avons été, pas même nous-mêmes,
sauf dans le souffle d'un échange sans arrière-pensée entre inconnus, ou un signe de tête entre amis.
Sinon, nous restons aussi anonymes que des insectes et ne sommes que pigments de couleur, battements d'ailes dans un rayon de lumière, posés sur un brin d'herbe ou une feuille un soir d'été.