I was dead, but nobody mourned me. Beethoven’s last symphony woke me up. I was lying in a poppy field with a copy of The Egyptian Book of the Dead on my belly. It was bound in velvet, bold gold letters on the front. I tried to think for how long I was dead, but the clear sky reminded me that the clouds were in my head and I would never have an answer.
It took someone immortal to bring me back from the dead. Beethoven’s hair was messy, like always. He frowned, his arms raised, directing an invisible orchestra. E.T.A. Hoffmann stood close to Beethoven, smiling at the people I could not see. I could hear them, though. They played the symphony that always brings me back to life, no matter in which corner of hell I am.
Jan Swafford wrote that Beethoven’s music is a gift to humanity across time. Coming back to life amid the lolling poppies, I knew he was right and that this immortal man will keep bringing us to life if we have the patience to listen. There was a woman in the field too. A cat purred around her ankles while she held a pile of notebooks. She came nearer and told me to “listen to Scarlatti and Stravinsky” and write daily. I told her I could not get over Deep Water. She smiled and told me to go and meet a stranger on a train.
Borges was there too. He has never stopped being my favorite librarian. He stood next to a tree, resting on his cane, blinded eyes to the sky, seeing things that most of us fail to see. Laurie Colwin came close and gave me a hand. She told me, “If we did things at a child’s true pace, the world would move with incredible slowness,” while Emily Dickinson handed me a lantern and told me to look for myself.
I sighed then because how many more times would I have to remember to find myself? I walked away, Beethoven’s symphony lacing my every step, and stopped when Borges’ fingers skimmed my elbow. He whispered to me then. “I am not sure that I exist, actually. I am all the writers that I have read, all the people that I have met, all the women that I have loved; all the cities I have visited.” I forgot the last time someone made me smile. I thought about how I did not need to look for myself. I was here already. I needed to peel away the unnecessary layers and be a blank canvas, or maybe a house sounded better. A home for all the books I have read and all the writers and artists that keep bringing me back from the dead. People may see sentences and melodies on my face instead of wrinkles—those who want to see them anyway because we can only see what we can handle.