Mesterul Manole
De Lucian Blaga
MOTTO: "Între pietrele atâtor împotriviri, care vointă nu s-ar fi măcinat până acum ?!"
Act 1 scene 3(excerpt) (Manole, Mira, Gomman)
Mira(coming from the right, shows up at the door in a simple long wh 17517i87r ite dress, barefoot):
Manole, may I come in?
Manole: Come, Mira, come in.
Mira: Is there no one else here?
Manole: The abbot is gone.
Mira: And Gomman?
Manole: Sleeping.
Mira: Should I come?
Manole: Come!
Mira: (enters the room) That nuisance.It's good he left. What have you two been talking about? (Turns candles off while jumping around the room)I've been eavesdropping you know, but didn't manage to understand much. just a word every once in a while.Despair, counting, faith, walls, soul... (With each word blows a candle out)Earth. I don't want to know anything more about all this.What a mix of tongues. no good being human to understand it.
Manole: Mira, don't blow them all out. Come here.
Mira: For our use the light in the corner is enough. don't you think so?(Sits on his knees and twists his hair with her fingers) Were you about to argue with the heavens?
(Manole stares at her)
Mira: It looks like you've tried some spells - look, you've sprinkled sand on your scrolls.
Manole: That's from Gomman's coat. His sheepskin coat. When he starts shaking. dust and sand come out of him.
Mira: He's a big person.(Blows towards the last candle from afar)
Manole: Don't blow it out.
Mira: (Takes his hand and covers the candle with it. The candle goes out.) I want you to stop dreaming. Why do you still want to keep the candles lit?
Manole: I wanted the windows alight so that the keepers might find their way through the night.
Mira: Is it late?
Manole: Judging by the sleepy cock's song, I'd say it's around midnight.
Mira: Judging by the skies it must be even later. and night after night the abbot keeps talking to you.Manole, you're loosing too much sleep.
Manole: For seven years now I've been losing faith ,losing sleep,losing walls . Have you not been sleeping either?
Mira: I've been contaminated by your unrest. After twisting and turning in between the sheets I decided to go to the porch. I came in. I came out. Can anybody sleep? The giant keeps shaking like a mountain. Even the birds outside keep their eyes wide open awaiting some unseen danger.
Manole: I was just about to punch the upper gates with my fists.
Mira: Manole, I know. You, you, restless soul, awoken thought and boundless dreaming. Leave the wall. Leave the spires. Why let the bitter black worries chew into your soul again?
Manole: By your side, the curse has not a word to say.
Mira: Will this forehead of yours never be smoothened again? Manole, smile. Look into my eyes and tell me - What are you hiding into yourself?
Manole: Fear, Mira. Fear of the path I find myself on. For I know not where I am nor where I am heading. And I know not whether it goes up or down, or whether I'm drawing closer to my goal or farther from it. How good it is it have you here! You, the beginning and the end.you everything.
Mira: My architect is dreaming. To him the woman brought from across the waters is not entirely all, but let's say, one half of it. The other half is this.(points towards the model of the church he's building) Don't even try to deny that. I am not at all upset about you comparing me with this wonder, frightened by the powers.
Manole: Between the two of you I make no difference - to me you both are but one.
Mira(playfully): This is why each morning I rejoice saying how good it is that it wants not to rise.
Manole: You think I'd rather go and embrace the stone, do you not? And that during the day I'd lose myself while caressing the walls. You fear that my night could come to be an eternal rest in here with the spire a sword between you and me.
Mira: These would not be reasons to worry. but it might happen that one day you call the church Mira and me - your church. The flurry then would be grim - ha ha!
Manole: Wouldn't that be for you a reason to make unkind jokes?
Mira: No, worry not, I've just been joking. (Looks at the details of the little church)Turn your toy around a little for me to see the towers. Like so. A little more to the other side. You know, I find myself thinking at times, what if you could never - but no! This right here will stand some day. For now it is merely on the table but one day it will stand firm on the hills. Look here! Indeed it is no joke, look for yourself. The windows are too small, like a pair of sleepy eyes. The towers too low. Do you not see?
Manole: It might be true. She is our joy from the beginning, sung in songs of brick and lime. Through long suffering much might yet come to improve.
Mira: Through suffering? Indeed. As I know you, you'd do much more than that. Lucky that is not on its way. And how? From a thought or deed ought it to come? Do you really want this? Let's just imagine, then.but better not. You'd be upset.
Manole: I won't be upset. Say it. Imagine what? It seems to me you'd like to mock my church some more.
Mira: No, something - else - as if - if I were to leave you and you would not be able to find me again?
Manole: Should I imagine you - you would leave - and I would not find you again?
Mira: Never find me, anywhere you'd look.
Manole (with faked ignorence)Done, I've imagined it.
Mira: Is it not so that looking for me, the windows of the church would be wider - like.
Manole(passionately kissing her)Oh, what a maddening taste of blood and sleep!
(Suppresses a movement and shows he is joking.)
Okay, you are gone. What happens next?
Mira: What happens next? Nothing, just that, is it not enough? You mean man! Through our love, with noise and troubles, seven years have passed. My leaving would not affect you - say than I were to die unexpectedly some day. I know no other woman could offer you relief. But at least the spires, the spires would rise thinner and higher, asking the heavens for my return. And then, a great pity it wouldn't be, if the heavens answered you not. You'd have the church in its eternal beauty!
Manole: Please Mira, leave me. Leave me! What do you want? No, no! I'll raise arms again. Dare the heights. Cursed be! Cursed! Cursed. Mira, you are the light of man. No, NO! Mira, Why? Humiliated by every stone, which knows how it should stand in the world, humiliated by every tree that grows haughtily. Without you, I would.
Mira: Calm down, Manole, calm down.
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