On this day I remember my infancy
in that magical time of school holidays
in Salamanca, late fifties of past century;
was the year-long waited occasion
of Epiphany when children receive presents in Spain.
The big family under the matriarch,
the imposing gothic dining room
with the wide chimney coated in walnut,
and its scent, characteristic odor;
the frieze of the octogonal perimeter,
high leaded windows with historical symbols,
the huge long table and the red velvet chairs…
was theater of the gathering for Christmas.
The dining room, that enchanted space,
was closed "with seven locks" this morning
In which the children waked very early
to warn grandmother and aunts
that the Kings perhaps have come already.
They had to appease our impatience impulses:
"wait for the rest to come down here all;
meanwhile you have already chocolate
and croutons: first do have breakfast
and after that, we will open the door. "
"Besides, I do not know for sure if Kings have come;
—a shadow of sadness were on our eyebrows
that moved grandmother to change the speech—
… thought I think so because someone has taken
the whole nougat that had been provided
and the champagne; not even just a drop!,
there is no water left in the basins:
what thirsty camels must have brought!
... and also look, don’t you smell of incense?;
it is indeed unequivocal sign
that they've been round here
apart some news that people talk about
of caravans treading the neighborhood."
With these and other such "reliable" data
one almost could see them in flesh and blood
cladded in their strange exotic garments
bearing the gifts carried by entourages.
"But still not that heavy guy here present!;
we must go up to pull him from the bed,
throw him sawdust taken from the crib
and put under his pillow a shepherd or a cow... "
After a lapse that seemed to us eternal,
uncles, aunts, grandmother, friends and parents
and of course our noisy bunch of children
were all assembled in front the closed door:
"who can this open?" but "where is then the key?" ...
What a thrill !, the mystery had us
taken upon his great exotic wings
in a magical and fascinating moment;
Oh yes "you're so beautiful"! , "but please do not stop!".
… and the doors opened -error- to heartbreak:
a great illusion while parcels were unpack
and contents seemed to match the expectations
then a short time playing with the games;
and life went on, inexorable fate
to grow and thus unravel mysteries.
But these myths of childhood homeland,
layed the foundation of the entire development
to be man and look for other toys
and discard them moreover in detachment.
That was the lesson that taught the "day of Kings":
to make patent with overwhelming intensity
what is happiness and that is fully possible,
but remove shortly from the object the spell;
finally realizing that nothing can give me
the fullness that I am, moreover
I am the only one who put & withdraw
the bliss conveyed by the forms
and is my mind who manipulates the game
... and so stay at the end with the source
from which arrises all the joy and beauty:
my own independent identity no less,
freed from bondages to which I submit:
external things, people or circumstances ...
to be now lived directly from the bottom
where there is joy without motive at all.
