OLD
LADY BORA*
 From
times immemorial, the white-haired old lady Bora lived in
a desolate den surrounded by bare karst. The whiteness of
the poor villages nested in scanty greenness was far and away
from Bora's abode.
Folks feared old lady Bora. Whenever she passed through a
village with her disentangled and unbridled hair fluttering
in the wind like a flag, woman ran away and children hid in
the houses. That is why Bora spent most of her time squatting
in front of her den, often bursting into tears from sorrow
and anguish. Trees bent and bushes whined under her sighs.
Bora would go on sitting in front of her den, caressing the
bare karst with her callous hand. After sundown she sometimes
went for walks through the fractured and frightening caves.
Under her feet the whitish sage shivered and the underbrush
groaned, and the dwell-ers in the far off village houses pricked
up their ears as they listened to her lonely weeping.
On somberly days, old lady Bora would go down to the sea-shore,
which was under the rule of her brother, Gale. What a storm
and din they would make! How the waves would crash and bang!
In the clear-skied dawn old lady Bora returned to her karstic
den to fall asleep, exhausted. She slept for months and months.
During her slumber the barren and naked landscape would come
to life, the dells and valleys would become green, the scent
of flowers filled the air. The sparrows on the wooden fences
chirped with joy and the nightingale sang his beautiful love-song,
just to keep Bora asleep.
That was how it was until the day when Bora suddenly woke
up again in her lonesome kastik den. She got up and opened
the door of her den. As the door opened, the sky was overcast
with murky clouds and Bora's sigh turned into a haughty wind.
The strong blasts of wind destroyed everything, demolishing
the fields, groves and vineyards. Pain-afflicted flowers,
broken branches, trees laid bare everywhere.
The peasants lamented over the waste land...
*
__ *
During
the great sorrow and sadness a tramp appeared in the village
and stopped off at the first house to beg for a meal and to
be put up for the night. Although reluctantly, the hosts received
him. After supper and a glass of wine the hosts became more
talkative, and were joined by their neighbors who also-dropped
in. All of them complained against old lady Bora and tried
to weave a plot to expel her. Suddenly the tramp spoke up:
"Listen, good people. I'll help you, but you must listen
carefully to what I'll say. When old lady Bora goes down to
the sea, we'll demolish her den. Homeless, she will abandon
this region and the karst will turn into a country of milk
and honey."
And so, in the pitch black night the tramp, with the help
of the peasants, destroyed Bora's den while Bora was down
on the seashore calling for her brother Gale. She shouted
his name, sitting on the ruins of the ancient town, where
once upon a time a beautiful maiden stood on a balcony awaiting
her blond Prince. But the Prince had run off with some other
maiden of that same town, and with the passage of years, that
beautiful maiden from that hilltop town became the old and
unhappy Bora.
When old lady Bora and her brother Gale had their fill of
wailing over the sea, at daybreak she returned to her rocky
karst. There she found that her home was demolished. Since
then, she became even more infuriated. On that unlucky day
she ravaged and laid the region waste so severely that she
uprooted all the white sage and aromatic herbs, and killed
the peasants and the tramp. Tired and breathless, in the black
of the night she sunk down into a karstic abyss where she
fell asleep.
And so Bora never abandoned the karst and to this very day
she sleeps in that karstic abyss. Whenever she wakes, horrified
she looks around. Gets up, whines and howls around the houses
and her wails tell the story of how her home was demolished,
and in anger she destroyed the crops and vineyards. Whenever
she remem-bers that event, she lashes into fury throught the
villages, ripping off the roof shingles, scaring the women
and children. And when she becomes feeble and withdraws to
sleep in her kastic abyss, the barren waste land again comes
to life, flowers bloom and the song of the nightingale is
heard...
--------------------------------
* A strong NE wind in the upper Adriatic
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