He smiled again and said: What brings you? I said: – The circle of my vision widened and I saw the river, and when it widened again I saw you and the fishermen.  – Did you like the river and those on its sides?  – No, but they raise something in me.  – They raise what?  -Should I say calm?…I don’t know.  So let’s ask an easy question: Did you like the river more or the road?  – On the road, of course, because I walked on it and exhausted the pleasure in it… as well as the pain in it.  – But you don’t know the river yet?  – I think I knew him.  – No, my friend… Rather, you thought you knew him.  -What’s the difference?!  – It is the difference between the peak and the plains… between the surface of the water and the depths.  – But the river water is clear and transparent… and I can see its depths.  – Or you imagine that you see his decision.  – Isn’t what I see the decision then?  – He has no decision, my good friend!  – You accuse me of being imaginative in my view… and I, in turn, accuse you of going too deeply into your view. I see the decision as clear and you see it as profound… profound to the point of nothingness.  -Who do you think is right?  – The truth is always the disaster.  – Where is the truth?  -Or interest you?  He smiled and did not answer, but it was important to me.. I was interested in proving this to this sophist who sat on the edge of the river, frightened and trembling from its depths. I proved that I was more experienced than him – and I had come a long way – so I decided to do something… to wade into the river and stand by its direction, and then send a sigh of relief to the frightened person sitting there. I took off my clothes, and my friend was amazed when I threw myself into the clear, transparent water. I stretched my legs as hard as I could to find the decision…and I found it. But it was also… transparent water and I started to fall… falling into the depths, but I fell and fell until my chest was tight and I did not feel any decision… any decision.  The life in my body was shaken, but I clung to the life that was howling in my body, the howling of wolves, exhausted by prolonged hunger and darkness, and I began to struggle to escape from the depths… to escape my death. Finally I found the beach after I saw that my death was closer to me than this decision, but I had bought a lot of water from the river against my will and put on my clothes and started cursing the unknown, my self that always seeks something that almost made me die while he was sitting now giving me a bewildering smile, but in it… A lot of lamentation.  I turned my back on the river, the fishermen, and the distant horizon, and headed toward the road that I had left in an hour of hesitation that was also cursed. At that time, I felt a new strange feeling. I felt an unknown attacker entering my fortified castle from the darkness of the depths. Was it coming from the clear water that I drank against my will?!  * * * I looked at the long road, heart pounding and breathless. It was as if it had come from hell and its stones were made from the hearts of heretics. And nothing was growing on its sides except astragalus and thorns. The weather was deathly cold, with the wind whistling hideous, haunting melodies. And here and there there was a dry, barren desert, with no flowers, no crops, no sticks, no buds… but rather particles of sand and dust lying in silence as if they were nothingness. I did not find a path other than this path… and there was no life in that spot other than the signs of life in front of me.  Is this the way my journey began? Could the water I drank against my will have made me drunk?  And despite the sudden, overwhelming change I felt, I walked sad, lost in mind like a catfish, dead-hearted like the atoms of nothingness, and dead-set like the stones from which the road is made.. I walked as if I were an ugly, dull melody from the wind’s melodies. Rather, I walked as if I were perishing on the way. I saw a person lying on a pile of astragalus. He was extending his hand in a question, and deep inside him things and things were lying. He was all hidden in his shabby clothes and behind his appearance was a strong body, and he was neither hungry nor sick… but in his look there was a meaning… a harsh and petrified meaning… the meaning that pushes germs into the body of a healthy person so that they live at his expense and are fed from his blood to create for themselves a life that contains his death. He wanted to say, “O filthy pigs, don’t you see my outstretched hand?” Is it not enough for you that I fake weakness, hunger, and poverty so that you can give me strength, food, and money?  Another person passed by me. He saw the wretch standing against the trunk of a tree, so he extended his hand and gave him something, keen for everyone passing by to see his hand so that they would realize that he was a person who was provoked by such wretched people. He gave him a look that said: How have I neglected you!… And how brilliant I am!  I smiled at the real play that took place between the questioner and the official, and then the path swallowed me.. And the deeper I walked, the more delegations of arrivals flocked to me.. all of them were like me, striving for the disappearance that I missed.. all of them, just as I was, making an effort to move on, pleased with its trees, breezes, and plants, and I glimpsed in the crowd of creation my friend. So I struggled until I grabbed his arm…and I was about to say something to him, but his gaze froze The words are on my lips. Behind the smile with which he painted his face, the flame of what he stored in his deep sleeve appeared to me, and I could see in the flame his distress and resentment. I could tell what he wanted to say if it were not for the smile that quickly spread to his face.. He wanted to say: You did not bother me, this one… You did not take time from me that would have been better spent in diligent pursuit.. I am upset with you and your friendship, and I only knew you because I needed One day, my need for you has passed, so what is my need for you? I felt that he wanted to cut off my hand, which was hurting his arm at the time. So I let go of his arm… and I walked quickly so as not to read too much into its depths… I was satisfied with the sparks of flame, so what do I need of fire?  In my haste, I collided with the tall, chunky gentleman, and he smiled apologetically at me. I was amazed at how the curses he cast from within were transformed into smiles on his face with such ease and speed, but my astonishment disappeared when my gaze began to mess with what was contained between his ribs… to mess with the modern filth in this dark place… to mess with. With a feeling of bliss and joy that piled up in one of his corners…bliss and joy Because today he was able to take the morsel that was on its way to the empty stomach of his slaves…to transform it into the precious clothes and the gold that surrounds his wrist and fingers…then he looks at the herd that passes around him and his thoughts call out to them: Come and look at me, the master who wears the most expensive and whose skin has not touched the sun. Come, kneel under my feet, then lift me up on your necks so that you can see me as a master. He did not see me… and anyone who passed by without paying attention to my shoes kneeled at my feet.  So I looked at him – not kneeling – and then at his shoes, and I did not feel much difference in looking at them. And off I went.  * * * I walked until I noticed between the heavy legs two smooth legs that said, “You idiot, do you see my beauty? Don’t you come to make my temptation even more intense?” And next to her were two other heavy legs, this time saying: Come back, you idiot. The soft legs have cost me a lot. Or… come on, if you are really full of pockets. A husband and wife have joined each other and gone on with the seekers.. and what was the widest gulf between them, even if their faces were close together and their hands were intertwined. . The wife looks at her husband absent-mindedly and wishes that he would die so that she can gain his wealth.. and she becomes free and free to have fun as she wants.. and looks with her eyes as she wants.. instead of the fleeting flashes that she gives to the young, bubbly, estranged. And the husband wonders: Is this one you are carrying really my son… the mother of my partner’s son, to whom I sent you – for some matter – on a dark night? Even the little child was quarrelsome and struggled to get rid of the arm that was wrapped around him, and the false kisses that his father used to shower on him, which were… In reality, she is moaning about how much you will exhaust me, you wretched person… and how much you will cost me, you ferrets… and can I benefit from you for what I am paying now? for you? And the deceitful curses that his mother used to give him and mutter: Well, my child… now your father will not be able to divorce me!