Love is a reason for suffering. From olden times this belligerent feeling has always been present. Look at God how much he loved his singularity and power that he banished the Unloved One, then justified the sacrifice of his own Son for the sake of Man, and finally to disappear. No one has heard of his love for years. Everywhere only pain and misery. And happiness is a longing to have, not to feel. I'm convinced that brambles will grow on my grave. A candle that's gone.
Carmen-Ecaterina Ciobâcă
She couldn't swallow me since I had entered to the Pedagogy Highschool. She had failed maths. She married the militiaman and became a grocery clerk. When I asked for a few slices of salami, she told me that only peasants could take it. Intellectuals buy from the city, by card. She had permed hair and long, red fingernails. On big days, relatives got coffee and oranges under the counter. After the '90s, she sniffed the wind of change. When she comes to the village, she doesn't even look at a poor schoolteacher. She's madame senator.
Carmen Tot
When the bullet exited the barrel of the gun, the riders and loaded wagons sprang into the promised land. No one remembered anything of the past: fathers coughing up the black coal dust from their alcohol-soaked lungs, the communal latrine at the end of the street where we huddled, cursing our mother, the green-eyed Ireland, but empty in her purse, eyes bruised faster than they could heal, the boat full of rats, the rancid fish. I stuck the flag in the ground. It is mine. As far as the eye can see.
(Translated by Andreea Iulia Udroiu / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.