“Tell me again,” he said
as I spoke over the distance
the professor in Buenos Aires
myself on a bench in the Tuileries
having walked endlessly
trying to find the words—
“It began in a world out of time,”
my voice low, although no one
was close enough to overhear
“Go on,” insisted the professor—
“A voyage to an island unmapped
that simply appeared
on the horizon, the explorers eager
to find refuge landed unaware
on the shores of a place unnamed—"
“Intriguing,” he whispered
and I could imagine his unseeing eyes
cast inward on a vast imaginary realm,
searching already to name what
language had yet to shape—
“The crew set about exploring,” I continued,
“the sand a gravelly dark pitch,
gleaming with mica.”
I shut my eyes, seeing what I was trying
to bring to life, “And there were figures,
In the distance, like shadows.”
“Alive?” asked the professor.
“Yes, for they moved suddenly, aware
of the explorers.”
“How many?”
“Only a few, perched on the sand, but
they turned as the explorers began to approach.”
“And? What did they see?”
How to describe? “They were not tall,
their skin leathery. Some had fins
along their spines with webbed feet.
Some had legs, while others
crawled like crabs.
There were horns coming out of heads
with smallish eyes
and mouths with gills.
One had tentacles like an octopus,
another a tail like a long fin.”
“Tritons,” he said, “how marvellous!”
“Tritons?”
“Creatures of Greek myths, born from
the union of Poseidon and Amphitrite;
a sea creature who comes to land.
And then there is the Coelacanth,
long extinct from the time of the dinosaurs.
A cross between a finned fish
and tetrapods.”
Of course he would know.
I went on, “The explorers didn’t dare
move closer, apprehensive. And then swiftly,
the creatures moved,
some into water, others
into the dense scrub along the beach.”
“Ah. Were they seen again?”
“No, it was only a brief sighting
and by day’s end the explorers returned
to their vessels and the sea.”
The professor sighed. “Such an encounter!
I could only dream of such a privilege.”
But he would never be able to see it.
I had become his eyes,
searching the world for the magic
and adventures he craved.
Instead he would write,
yet another story
in his book of unfathomable,
imaginary beings.
More real to him, than the world
we both lived in.
Elsa Guillaume, Fictions, exhibition, 2023
La Patinoire Royale, Galerie Valérie Bach, Brussels
Multimedia installation
