Snö

I wrote a short story recently that I call What does snow feel like? It is about a man who has never seen snow in real life, only in pictures, and he has read books about it. To him, snow seems mysterious and wonderful. He thinks about it, what it feels like, what it smells like; he knows that it's very cold, but how cold exactly -- could he ever imagine? Is it even possible to imagine something one doesn't know?.. The story is here (it's kind of a writing competition), but -- je suis désolée, mes amies, le petit conte est en suédois...

Jag har "publicerat" en novell på "Kapitel 1" (http://www.kapitel1.se/), där man kan lägga ut sina texter i hopp om att få många läsare och många positiva kommentarer. Blir man den mest populära författaren, så kan man få ett kontrakt hos Piratförlaget...

Då tänkte jag att hm, varför inte, jag kan ju alltid försöka...

Den korta berättelsen, som är nyskriven, heter Hur känns snö?, och den finns att läsa HÄR.

Voyage

[This is a short piece of fiction, written about a year ago. New English translation.]

The rocks are hard and cold, but they are red and glimmering further up. The sun is going down behind the mountain, and the sunbeams are coloring the water around the boat like drops of blood orange juice in a glass of water.
It is cold now, the surface is crisped by a wind from the north. But I am afraid that it will become even colder soon.
“Do you want to turn back”, Y says, “it is not to late?”
I shake my head. I don’t think it matters what we do, our best chance is to keep on going in our boat. We have very little food left, I doubt we will survive a voyage back.
“No", I say, "not if you don’t want to.”
Y puts down the oars in the water and we glide forward. Closer to the mountain, closer to the border.
We will soon be beyond what anyone has ever returned from.
We hear a thunder, as if from a waterfall. Yes, something like that is supposed to be there, I have heard. But then what? Nobody believes that the world ends there, that there is only nothingness behind the falls. But, it must be some kind of ending, nevertheless.
Or a beginning.
I see a fire of determination in Y’s eyes. I know what he is thinking: this is his life’s adventure, and he will not lose this opportunity, not even if it means death.
And I have chosen to follow him, rather than to survive alone.
We go around a big rock, and when we are behind it, the sun cannot reach us anymore. It is very cold now, and the thunder is almost deafening.
No, the sound is not a waterfall, but something similar. Because I was expecting falling water, my first thought is that there is something wrong with the view.
A huge mountain is rising in front of us, and it is so high that it makes me feel sick and I think that I will fall backwards when I look up. I think I can see snow high up there. The mountain is spreading out just as far in both directions. The black water is clucking around the rocking and swinging boat.
There is a crack in the mountain right in front of us, and that’s where the sound of water comes from. But the water is not gushing forth towards us, it is on it’s way into the mountain. It is foaming and sprinkling, as if the water is in a hurry.
“That way”, Y says, pulling the oars in for a moment.
I realize that we will sucked in by the ice cold water. It seems unlikely that one will ever be able to get out that way, in the opposite direction of the wild water. And we don’t know if there is something on the other side.
“Are you sure that you want to do this?”, I say, with my voice shrill with fear.
“I have to”, he says, “I just have to know what’s there.”
And the water pulls at the boat. We are inside the mountain now. The mountain walls are so close upon us that a slightly larger boat would get stuck and be crushed. Y barely had time to pull back the oars before the speed was too much for any of us to be able to hold on to any thoughts. After only a few moments, there is so dark, we can no longer see anything.
For all that I know the cave in the mountain has maybe extended itself, we would have been able to swing both backward and to the sides. Time and space become blurred. Everything is just a single perception of that life is about to expire.
Then it becomes brighter, and I realize with dizziness that the tunnel in the mountain actually has an end. We are still going very fast in the cramped space, but I think that it still takes a few minutes before we fly out of the mountain.
The boat is falling with the water that is now actually falling, and it is a miracle that the boat does not capsize.
Now, everything is quiet around us. Silence, cold. Dusk, almost night.
We look at each other in deafening silence.
And Y says:
”Is this all?”
The water is spreading shiny like a mirror but black around us. Behind us are the dark mountains. Mountains pile up around us as far as we can see, they are immobile icebergs.
Ice in the water, dark iceberg and only silence, barely a gust of wind. The place is waste, and it is so huge that I feel completely dead inside.
”It is said that there is something wonderful beyond the mountains", Y says voicelessly. “Freedom, beauty, happiness. They say you never want to return.”
”One can not return”, I point out. “We knew that after all - how could all the talk about happiness be anything but fairy tales?”
”So this is all”, he says.
”It is almost night”, I say. “Tomorrow when the sun rises and we see glittering in the ice, then the sky is blue - maybe it will be really beautiful here, in daylight.”
Y hears that I speak without conviction. We feel that the future is as blank as the ice in the water.
From his backpack Y picks up hats, gloves and two pieces of bread, hard and tough. We chew resolutely, remembering the flavours and fragrances from a lost life.
Then, he finds two candles. We keep them in our hands and we try to get as much heat as we possibly can from the small flames.

Hud av glas/Skin of glass

En översättning av en liten grej jag skrev för ett antal år sedan. Originalet efteråt.

This is a translation of a text I wrote a few years ago. It is an excess in romanticism - not my best piece of work ever, but I still wanted to see what the translation made of it.

[A mermaid - by the great JW Waterhouse]

Her skin was made of glass that night. Dreams were swirling under the skin like beautiful shadows. They were almost invisible unless you came very, very close. She was transparent as glass that night because the whirlwinds inside her wanted to be stronger than her shell.

She dreamed for example about a forest. The pines were very straight and high, the spruces swept their branches over the moss, everywhere were bushes and thickets, needles, soft green leaves. Little sunbeams gleamed between the trees where insects danced as if in the light of spotlights. It was their own dance and they didn’t care if someone saw them. Birds sang, sometimes far away, sometimes close. Sometimes rustle was heard, and rattle, the sound of wings and falling branches. A half-light rested over the forest, the moss was warm and on some places a little damp.

In the forest were many paths. Some were often walked upon, others were small and twisted, almost as if they were secret. Sometimes two paths met and sometimes one took an unexpected turn, maybe back to the starting point.

One of the paths led to a small lake. It was surrounded by trees, the ground fell away towards the lake. The surface was dark and smooth, here and there were little islands. White water lilies, white and pointed petals rested against green leaves with long stems somewhere down there where perhaps fish were swimming.

It was like this in the dream: something was down there in the depths. The forest and the lake, the light, everything was so peaceful that she could not be afraid, but she knew that there was something there. She stirred anxiously in her sleep and it swirled faster under her skin of glass, because she was maybe soon going to wake up.

What was it? Something moved and then everything was still again, but different. A mermaid sat among the water lilies. Her hair wriggled in dark curls over her bare shoulders. The skin was as white as the lilies, she carresed them slowly with small soft fingers. She smiled when she touched the petals and smelled their scent. The mermaid lowered herself down under the water and started swimming slowly. Then she got up again and water drops laid like diamonds on her breasts.

The mermaid made a gesture with her little hand – to ward off or welcome? The girl wanted to wake up now.

Her skin was thinner than glass and it was night. She had another dream.

There was a wide, empty space. The darkness had no beginning and no end, it would last eternally. She didn’t want to be in this desolate place. Then she saw that something glistened around her and she believed that it was the mermaid’s diamond water drops that had followed her into the new dream.

No, it was stars. The space was not empty, there were stars that beamed and sang. They invited her to star dance and glistened with a violet glow. She danced and swirled and laughed happily until she saw that the stars almost resembled eyes in a face.

It was a beautiful, friendly face that wanted to hear her sing but she was scared and wanted to wake up again.

She took a leap and her skin of glass almost burst. Under it, the wild swirling was unstoppable, it swirled without following any laws anymore because she struggled so hard.

Everything was chaos but she could not wake up that night because her skin was so thin that the dreams were seen though it.

She was in another dream where she ran very fast in stairs that wounded along until she came to the attic in a big house. There was so much junk and spider-webs here and there, but much cleaner than she would have expected. She didn’t know who she was hiding from but she jumped up in a big bed and covered herself with the blanket.

Hush, don’t be afraid, you know that it is not dangerous, a warm and friendly voice said. The girl was happy because she wanted to believe it.

She took a leap to the next dream and there the sky was blue. It was like the prefect holiday one would want to remember forever. She was stretched out in a blue sun chair and on a white little table beside her was a drink with a slice of lemon and an pink paper umbrella. At her feet was the swimming pool, blue as the sky.

Someone spoke to her, very tenderly, but she didn’t want to listen. She wanted to shut her ears as well as her eyes but she had no earlids. She jumped into the pool to get away, even though she knew that she really couldn’t. When she came to the bottom she found that she saluted her fear as her heart’s greatest desire and she let herself float towards the hands, the shimmering white hands, that wanted to touch her.

Yes, it was a dream, but she couldn’t, not even in a dream, stay under water very long. She set herself against the bottom and aimed towards the light above the surface. She was not afraid anymore.

Her skin was made of glass that night but only as long as darkness surrounded her. Blood and tissue began to feel that morning came closer, but the swirling under the skin didn’t want to retire quite already. It wanted to know for sure first, that she wouldn’t forget everything when she saw the real sun.

In the hour before the dawn she floated between being awake and asleep as if in a soft haze. The blood surged warm and red under her glass skin. Salt from skin under holiday sun. Warmth from a blanket. Freedom from a vast space. Scents from a forest. A precentiment that grew to certainty.

One last dream before she was completely awake. It was a door, very thin and simple but she had still been afraid to open it. She had never dared to ask what was behind it. But now. She wasn’t afraid anymore.

The sun was dancing red and hot on the other side of her closed eyes when she opened the door. Her skin was smooth and non-transparent. She was ready to wake up from her dream about reality to something that was so much more.

[original text]

Den natten var hennes hud av glas. Under huden surrade, snurrade drömmarna som vackra skuggor. De gick nästan inte att se om man inte kom mycket, mycket nära. Hon var genomskinlig som glas den natten för nu ville virvelvindarna inom henne bli starkare än hennes skal.

Hon drömde till exempel om en skog. Tallarna var mycket raka och höga, granarna svepte sina grenar över den mossklädda marken, över allt fanns buskar och snår, sly och barr, mjuka gröna blad. Mellan trästammarna glimmade små solstrålar där flygfän dansade som i strålkastarljus. Det var deras egen dans och de brydde sig inte om ifall någon såg dem. Fåglar sjöng, ibland avlägset, ibland nära. Ibland hördes prassel och rassel, vingslag och grenar som föll. Ett halvdunkel vilade över skogen, mossan var varm och på vissa ställen lite fuktig.

I skogen fanns många stigar. Vissa var väl upptrampade, andra var små och slingrande, nästan som om de var hemliga och sällan beträdda. Ibland möttes två och ibland ledde en åt något oväntat håll, kanske tillbaka dit där man hade startat.

En av stigarna ledde till en tjärn. Den var omgiven av träd, marken sluttade litet ner mot vattnet. Vattenytan var mörk och blank, här och där vita små öar. Vita näckrosöar, vita, spetsiga kronblad som vilade mjukt mot platta gröna blad med långa stjälkar någonstans där nere där kanske fiskar simmade omkring.

I drömmen var det så att något fanns där nere i djupet. Skogen och tjärnen, ljuset, allting var så fridfullt att hon inte kunde vara rädd men hon visste att något fanns där. Hon rörde oroligt på sig i sömnen och det snurrade fortare under hennes glashud för nu skulle hon kanske snart vakna.

Vad var det? Något rörde sig och sedan var allt stilla igen, fast annorlunda. En sjöjungfru satt bland näckrosorna. Hennes hår slingrade sig i mörka lockar över hennes bara axlar. Huden skimrade lika vit som näckrosorna hon sakta smekte med små, smidiga fingrar. Hon log när hon rörde vid de sidenmjuka kronbladen och drog in deras doft. Sjöjungfrun sänkte sig ner under vattnet och simmade sakta en bit på rygg. Sedan reste hon sig upp igen i en kaskad av vattendroppar som låg som gnistrande diamanter på hennes bröst.

Sjöjungfrun gjorde en gest med sin lilla hand – avvärjande eller välkomnande? Flickan ville vakna nu.

Hennes hud var tunnare än glas och det var natt. Hon drömde en annan dröm.

Det var en tom, vid rymd. Mörkret hade ingen början och inget slut, det skulle vara evinnerligen. I denna tomma ödslighet ville hon inte vara. Då såg hon att något glittrade omkring henne och hon trodde att det var sjöjungfruns diamantvattendroppar som hade förföljt henne till den nya drömmen.

Nej, det var stjärnor. Rymden var inte tom, där fanns stjärnor som strålade och sjöng. De bjöd in henne till stjärndans och glittrade med violglöd. Hon dansade och snurrade och skrattade lyckligt tills hon såg att stjärnorna nästan var som ögon i ett ansikte.

Det var ett vackert, vänligt ansikte som ville höra henne sjunga men hon blev rädd och ville vakna igen.

Hon tog ett stort språng och det var nära att hennes glashud sprack. Under den gick det vilda snurrandet inte att hejda, det snurrade utan att följa några lagar längre eftersom hon kämpade emot.

Allt var kaos men den natten kunde hon inte vakna eftersom hennes hud var så tunn att drömmarna lyste igenom.

Hon hamnade i en annan dröm där hon sprang mycket snabbt i vindlande trappor tills hon kom till vindsvåningen i ett stort hus. Där fanns så mycket gammalt bråte och en och annan spindelväv men det var renare än hon hade väntat. Hon visste inte vem hon gömde sig för men hon hoppade upp i en stor säng som stod mitt på golvet och drog täcket över sig.

Såja, var inte rädd, du vet ju att det inte är farligt! sa en varm och vänlig röst. Flickan blev glad för hon ville gärna tro det.

Hon tog ett språng till nästa dröm och där var himlen lysande blå. Det var som den perfekta semesterdagen man vill minnas för evigt. Hon låg utsträckt i en blå solstol och på ett vitt, lågt litet bord bredvid henne stod en drink med en citronskiva i och ett rosa pappersparasoll. Vid hennes fötter fanns en swimmingpool, blå som himlen.

Någon talade till henne, mycket ömt och mjukt men hon ville inte lyssna. Hon ville sluta sina öron lika väl som sina ögon men hon hade ju inga öronlock. Hon hoppade ner i poolen då för att komma undan trots att hon visste att det egentligen inte gick. När hon kommit till botten upptäckte hon att hon hälsade sin fruktan som det hon inom sig allra mest åtrådde och hon lät sig flyta mot händerna, skimrande vita, som ville röra vid henne.

Ja, en dröm var det men inte ens i drömmen kunde hon vara under vatten särskilt länge. Hon tog spjärn mot botten och sköt sig uppåt mot ljuset ovan vattenytan. Nu var hon inte rädd längre, inte alls rädd.

Den natten var hennes hud av glas men bara så länge mörker låg skyddande runt omkring. Blod och levande vävnader började ta ut sin rätt när dagen nalkades men det som snurrade och surrade där under huden ville inte dra sig tillbaka riktigt än. Det ville först veta säkert att slaget var vunnet, att hon inte skulle glömma alltihop igen när den verkliga solen lyste över henne för att få henne att tro att allting alltid skulle vara så som alla andra trodde.

I timmen före gryningen svävade hon mellan vakenhet och sömn i ett mjukt töcken. Blodet svallade varmt och rött under hennes glashud. Salt från hud under semestersol. Värme från ett skyddande täcke. Frihet från en vidsträckt rymd. Dofter från en dunkel skog. En aning som växte till visshet.

En sista dröm innan hon var helt vaken. Det var en dörr, mycket tunn och enkel men hon hade ändå varit rädd för att öppna den. Hon hade aldrig vågat fråga på allvar vad som dolde sig bakom den men nu var hon inte rädd längre.

Solen dansade het och röd på andra sidan hennes stängda ögonlock när hon i drömmen öppnade dörren. Hennes hud var slät och ogenomskinlig, hon var redo att vakna upp ur sin dröm om verkligheten till något som var mycket mer.