7 h 34 au caf\u00e9 du village
\nLa nuit derni\u00e8re, j\u2019ai r\u00eav\u00e9 d\u2019un tatouage. Quelle \u00e9trange chose! Ce n\u2019\u00e9tait pas l\u2019image de la jolie colombe de Picasso, ni celle de l\u2019abeille embl\u00e9matique de Bonaparte. Ce n\u2019\u00e9tait pas non plus le mont Fuji que j\u2019ai contempl\u00e9 de tr\u00e8s pr\u00e8s en 2015, ni le beau soleil jaune de Cora, ni quoi que ce soit que j\u2019aurais pu ch\u00e9rir au point de vouloir le tatouer sur ma peau.<\/p>\n
Je suis d\u2019ailleurs rebelle \u00e0 ce genre de choses. Et pourtant, la femme qui s\u2019est r\u00e9veill\u00e9e dans mon lit ce matin fixait son avant-bras gauche. Elle caressait les huit chiffres et les quatre lettres d\u2019orthographe d\u2019un tatouage \u00e0 l\u2019encre bleue d\u2019environ un demi-pouce de hauteur.<\/p>\n
Cette femme du r\u00eave n\u2019\u00e9tait pas moi; elle \u00e9tait juste LA PEUR EN MOI; la peur de faiblir, la peur de perdre mes facult\u00e9s et la terrible peur de mourir. Je le confesse, j\u2019ai un attachement quasi irraisonnable \u00e0 cette vie terrestre et je perds facilement ma s\u00e9r\u00e9nit\u00e9 en imaginant ma derni\u00e8re heure.<\/p>\n
Toute la nuit durant, c\u2019est la peur qui parlait et qui agissait \u00e0 ma place. C\u2019est elle qui a eu l\u2019affreuse id\u00e9e d\u2019un tatouage. Elle sait que je suis gauch\u00e8re et que l\u2019encre doit \u00eatre du bleu de la Baie-des-Chaleurs o\u00f9 je suis n\u00e9e.<\/p>\n
J\u2019en vois de plus en plus souvent de ces audacieuses \u0153uvres d\u2019art tatou\u00e9es sur la peau des humains. Je suppose que ces tr\u00e9sors, souvent bien cach\u00e9s, rendent hommage \u00e0 l\u2019animus qui les nourrit. Les symboles illustr\u00e9s peuvent se ressembler, mais le grain du canevas est unique et les rend impossibles \u00e0 dupliquer.<\/p>\n
C\u2019est la PEUR en moi qui a tout maniganc\u00e9. C\u2019est elle qui, pendant que je dormais, a fait tatouer ce passeport \u00e0 l\u2019encre ind\u00e9l\u00e9bile sur mon bras gauche. Elle qui a inscrit mon ann\u00e9e de naissance, le nom de ma grand-m\u00e8re paternelle (qui est aussi le mien) et la date de mon grand d\u00e9part : 1947-CORA-2047<\/p>\n
Ce tatouage onirique ne repr\u00e9sente pas une tendance artistique ni une cr\u00e9ation \u00e0 montrer. Je connais la PEUR qui m\u2019anime; elle a toutes mes qualit\u00e9s : audacieuse, entreprenante, astucieuse et infatigable. Ce qu\u2019elle veut dire \u00e0 propos de ce tatouage, c\u2019est une subtile exhortation lanc\u00e9e au Ma\u00eetre de l\u2019Univers. Comme un pacte \u00e9crit dans ma chair. Deux dates m\u2019assurant 100 ans d\u2019existence.<\/p>\n
10 h 35
\nElle parle, elle parle ma PEUR et elle veut toujours avoir raison. Elle aussi ne veut pas mourir. C\u2019est pourquoi elle insiste autant, venant dans mes r\u00eaves, me rempla\u00e7ant dans mon lit et me bourrant la t\u00eate de recettes de long\u00e9vit\u00e9.<\/p>\n
M\u00eame en \u00e9crivant cette lettre, elle me chuchote ses consignes. Elle m\u2019invite \u00e0 ne pas exhiber mon tatouage car il ressemble, mais n\u2019a rien \u00e0 voir, au marquage au fer rouge des esclaves de jadis. Les chiffres tatou\u00e9s sur mon avant-bras sont l\u00e0 pour convaincre mon corps de rester en vie. La PEUR conna\u00eet mon attachement \u00e0 cette vie d\u2019ici-bas. Comme elle ferait n\u2019importe quoi pour m\u2019encourager \u00e0 vivre, je lui pardonne ses incartades nocturnes. Je sais que cette suggestion de tatouage est un espoir, une alliance avec l\u2019au-del\u00e0.<\/p>\n
11 h 15
\nJour apr\u00e8s jour, ma longue vie s\u2019effrite, s\u2019allonge et court apr\u00e8s son souffle. Le reste de mon \u00e2ge vit dans une maison \u00e0 ciel ouvert d\u2019o\u00f9 s\u2019envolent des milliers de phrases \u00e0 cheval sur le vent. J\u2019aime dispara\u00eetre en fines tranches. Semaine apr\u00e8s semaine, mes lettres s\u2019appuient l\u2019une sur l\u2019autre comme les marches d\u2019un long escalier menant vers le paradis. Mot \u00e0 mot, je grimpe vers la fin \u00e0 pas de tortue.<\/p>\n
Je r\u00e9fl\u00e9chis si peu, avec cette vieille caboche et ces doigts crochus qui tapent encore des fautes sur le clavier. Vaille que vaille, j\u2019imagine qu\u2019un certain matin, tr\u00e8s t\u00f4t ou durant mon sommeil, un elfe bienveillant fermera mes paupi\u00e8res. J\u2019imagine qu\u2019\u00e0 cet instant pr\u00e9cis, sur la cinqui\u00e8me plan\u00e8te du Petit Prince de Saint-Exup\u00e9ry, un allumeur de r\u00e9verb\u00e8res fera na\u00eetre une nouvelle \u00e9toile.<\/p>\n
11 h 40
\nVoici que Carmen, mon habituelle voisine de table, me demande ce sur quoi j\u2019\u00e9cris.
\n\u2014 J\u2019\u00e9cris sur la mort, ch\u00e8re Carmen. Surtout sur ma peur de mourir.
\n\u2014 N\u2019aie crainte, ch\u00e8re Cora, \u00ab Quand on meurt, soit on s\u2019endort, soit on se r\u00e9veille. \u00bb
\n\u2014 Qui donc a dit cela?
\nCarmen ne s\u2019en souvient plus.<\/p>\n
Cora
\n\u2764<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
7 h 34 au caf\u00e9 du village La nuit derni\u00e8re, j\u2019ai r\u00eav\u00e9 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":414,"featured_media":19659,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19658","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lettre-mme-cora"],"acf":{"img_en":"","contenu_en":"7:34 at the coffee shop\r\nLast night, I dreamt of a tattoo. How strange it was! It wasn\u2019t Picasso\u2019s dove or Napoleon\u2019s emblematic bee. Nor was it Mount Fuji, which I contemplated from near in 2015, the beautiful yellow Cora sun or anything so special to me that I\u2019d want to have it inked onto my skin.\r\n\r\nI rebel against this type of thing. And yet the woman who woke up in my bed this morning was staring at her arm. She was running her fingers over a blue tattoo made up of 8 numbers and 4 letters approximately half an inch tall.\r\n\r\nThis woman in my dream wasn\u2019t me; she was the FEAR WITHIN ME; the fear of becoming weaker; the fear of losing my faculties and the terrible fear of dying. I must admit, I have an almost excessive attachment to this life on Earth and I quickly become agitated when I imagine my last hour.\r\n\r\nThe fear was active and verbose the entire night. It had the horrible idea of getting a tattoo. It knew to put it on my dominant side and even knew which colour to choose \u2014 the same blue that can be seen from the Baie-des-Chaleurs, where I was born.\r\n\r\nThis bold bodily artwork is increasingly common. No doubt these treasures, often hidden under clothing, pay tribute to the animus who feed them. The illustrations sometimes look alike, but the grain of each individual canvas is unique and renders them impossible to duplicate.\r\n\r\nIt\u2019s the FEAR in me that orchestrated everything. It had this lifespan tattooed in permanent ink on my left arm while I slept. It inscribed my birth year, the name of my father\u2019s mother\u2019s \u2014 which is also my name \u2014 and the year of my final departure: 1947-CORA-2047. \r\n\r\nThis dreamlike tattoo doesn\u2019t represent an artistic trend or a creation worth exhibiting. I know the FEAR that lives in me; it has all my qualities: audacious, enterprising, clever and tireless. The tattoo is a subtle exhortation to the Master of the Universe. A pact written in my flesh. Two dates that guarantee me 100 years of existence.\r\n\r\n10:35 a.m.\r\nMy FEAR has so much to say, and it always needs to be right. It doesn\u2019t want to die either. That\u2019s why it persists, coming to me in my dreams, taking possession of me as I sleep and filling my head with recipes for longevity.\r\n\r\nIt is even whispering instructions as I write this letter, dear readers. It is telling me to keep my tattoo to myself because it is similar to the markings seared onto slaves\u2019 bodies long ago. The epitaph on my arm instead serves as a powerful talisman: to keep my body alive. This FEAR knows how tightly I grip this life here below. Since it would do anything to urge me to keep on living, I forgive its nocturnal misdemeanours. I know that this tattoo is a message of hope, a supernatural deal with the ever after.\r\n\r\n11:15 a.m.\r\nMy long life crumbles, thins and exhales a bit more each day. The rest of my life lives in a roofless house from which thousands of sentences ride away; flying with the wind. I like disappearing gradually, finely sliced until there is nothing left. Week after week, my letters rest on the previous one like the steps of a long staircase leading to paradise. Word by word, I climb towards the end at a snail\u2019s pace.\r\n\r\nI don\u2019t use this old head of mine very much now, and my crooked fingers still type mistakes on the keyboard. One morning, while the world is starting to stir, or perhaps as I sleep, a kind elf will come and rest his hand on my forehead and close my eyelids. At that very moment, on the fifth planet of Saint-Exup\u00e9ry\u2019s Little Prince, the lamp-lighter will light a lamp and a new star will be born.\r\n\r\n11:40 a.m.\r\nCarmen, the person who usually sits at the table next to me at the coffee shop, asks what I am writing about.\r\n\u2014 \u201cI\u2019m writing about death, dear Carmen. About my fear of dying to be specific.\u201d\r\n\u2014 \u201cDon\u2019t worry, Cora dear, \u201cwhen we die, we either fall asleep or we wake up.\u201d\r\n\u2014 \u201cWho said that?\u201d\r\nCarmen doesn\u2019t remember.\r\n\r\nCora\r\n\u2764"},"yoast_head":"\n