Day 27

Air / Water temperature: 26°C (19°C at night) / 28°C

Wind direction / Bft: South-southwest / 2-3

Area: BITUMINIS PELAGUS (a splashing as from an old radio) – Nautical chart showing the route

Combuse: Alfoncino (800 g) salt and pepper lightly. Heat some olive oil in a frying pan, fry fish 2 minutes per side. Add to the pan 3 finely chopped garlic cloves, 1 seeded and finely chopped large green chilli, zest of 1 lemon, 2 tablespoons lightly chopped capers from brine, 1 finely chopped tomato, fry very briefly and deglaze with 3 dl white wine. Stir in the sauce 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard and add 12 grains Tasmanian pepper. Stew the fish for 5 minutes per side, while spooning frequently some sauce over. Season with salt. (More recipes from the Chief cook of «PS Narina»)

Perhaps I had too much to drink the previous evening. But as I stepped onto the deck early this morning everything looked a blur: the sun, the madly luminous sea, even the white of the boat. Against the sun it was as bad, with the ocean one was no better off – and so I thought: must the surface of a paper boat really be so blank? I then picked up a fat felt pen and decided to put down a sentence on my boat. 

While I ponder over the phrase with which I want to begin the description of my boat, my finger gets smudged black with ink because I’ve been fiddling with the pen cap – repeatedly pulling it off and putting it back on, thereby disturbing the tip – something that doesn’t always end in success. The little «plop» however holds a heart-warming pre-lingual appeal – it’s like a thought that puffs up on the tongue.

Once more I get the impression that Oskar’s shaking his head while trotting past. «What the hell’s the matter with you?» he seems to be asking: «Nobody going to bother to read your sentence. If ever we get to Santa Lemusa, nobody there is going to take any interest, for sure, in the felt pen-scribbled poem on the side of our boat.» He is correct – no doubt. But why should I not write a line just the hell because he believes that nobody will want to read it? Can’t I release my poetry from the tiresome obligation of absolutely having to be read? And am I not entitled to choose my every word with care even if it’s never going to be read? It’s important that I don’t write my texts for the drawer, for the purely theoretical reason that they can be read by someone – because this is the only way they can exist in this world. It’s equally important that they do not, as a necessity, have to be read; that even without a readership they hold the right to exist, and are beautiful in themselves. It’s not easy for me to say why it is so, but it makes all the difference, it’s all about freedom, about the right to be…

The most consistent answers to some existential questions cannot perhaps be buttressed from every angle. 

Oskar shakes his head. He’s unconvinced; he notices simply that my hands are black from fiddling with the pen. «Let’s take the case of a river», I try to explain: «A current of majestic strength flows through the water and it simply does not care whether there is anyone there to see it or not». The comparison strikes me as being somewhat pathetic. And Oskar forgives no refill. Ah, can one possibly explain the concept of happiness to an ant?

Next day (28)

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