As Far As Florence Adrift in Fiery Layers of Memory

The desert could not be claimed or owned—it was a piece of cloth carried by winds, never held down by stones, and given a hundred shifting names before Canterbury existed, long before battles and treaties quilted Europe and the East…. All of us, even those with European homes and children in the distance, wished to remove the clothing of our countries. It was a place of faith. We disappeared into landscape.

KATHARINE

               Do you promise?  I wouldn't want to die here.  I wouldn't want to die in the desert.  I've always had a rather elaborate funeral in mind, with particular hymns.  Very English.  And I know exactly where I want to be buried.  In our garden.  Where I grew up.  With a view of the sea.  So promise me you'll come back for you.

 

ALMÁSY

        I promise I'll come back.  I promise I'll never leave you.  And there's plenty of water and food.  You can have a party.

 

Katharine is writing.  The FLASHLIGHT is faint.  She shivers.

KATHARINE (O/S)

               ...the fire is gone now, and I'm horribly cold.  

I really ought to drag myself outside but then  there would be the sun..

.I'm afraid I waste the light on the paintings and on writing these words.

...bodies we have entered and swum up  like rivers, 

fears we have hidden in like this wretched cave...

...I want all this marked on my body.  

We are the real countries, 

not the boundaries drawn on maps with the names of powerful men...

...I know you will come and carry me out into the palace of winds,

 the rumors of water... 

That's all I've wanted - to walk in such a place with you, with friends, 

on earth without maps.  

The lamp's gone out and I'm writing in the darkness...

 Adrift in Fiery Layers of Memory

Soundtrack of The English patient. 

Music: Harry Rabinowitz : As Far As Florence