"What joy this is, Brother Leo!" said Francis, tears welling up into his eyes. "The sun, the skylark, matins, the brides of Christ who are awake before anyone else and glorifying the Beloved--what joy! I can hear Sister Clara's voice above the rest."
The office completed, the nuns flowed out into the cloister, wrapped in their white wimples. The moment they saw Francis they uttered shrill, happy cries, like hungry doves at the sight of wheat. Sister Clara was the first to come forward. She took Francis' bloody hand, covering it with her tears.
"Father Francis . . ." she murmured, her voice stifled with emotion, "Father Francis . . ."
"Sister Clara, I would like to remain near you and the other sisters for a few days. I greet you and bid you farewell: I am departing. Holy Mother Superior, give me permission to stay in the shelter of branches which is outside your convent."
Sister Clara gazed at Francis, her large eyes overflowing with tears.
"Father Francis, the shelter and the convent and all the sisters are at your service. Command us."
Francis' aged mother appeared. She had grown exceedingly thin and was deathly pale from her vigils and fasts, but her face beamed with happiness. She stooped in her turn to kiss her son's hand, and he placed his palm on her gray hair and blessed her.
"Mother," he whispered, "Mother . . . Sister Pica . . ."
Two of the sisters wanted to run to put the hut in order, but Clara made them step aside. "I shall do it myself," she said. "Bring me a broom, a pitcher of water, the potted flowers I have in my cell; also a lamp, and the cage with the goldfinch that the bishop gave us the other day."
Francis was exhausted. He sank to the ground beneath the tiny window of the sanctuary, and waited. His mother, her heart filled with pain and pride, watched him from the corner of the courtyard where she had withdrawn. His lips, feet, and hands had turned blue with cold. The sisters brought a heavy wool blanket with which to cover him, but he tossed it aside and tried to stand up, only to find that he did not have the strength. Two sisters ran to him. Supporting him under the arms, they brought him slowly, step by step, to the hut. Clara had laid a mat down for him, and on it a mattress well stuffed with straw; also a soft pillow. The sisters placed him on the mattress; then they departed, leaving the two of us alone once more.
I leaned over to his ear. "Do you want anything, Father Francis?"
"What could I possibly want, Brother Leo? What more could I want? I have everything."
He closed his eyes, nodding to me as though to bid me farewell.
That night he did not sleep a moment, but raved deliriously, his forehead, hands--his entire body--shooting forth flames. The following afternoon he finally opened his eyes.
"Brother Leo, instruct the sisters not to come to see me any more. Tell them I want to be alone and that I do not have need of anything. All I want now is quiet. Nothing else. No fire, no food--just quiet."
Seizing the pillow, he hurled it away from him.
"Take this and throw it outside, Brother Leo. The devil is inside it; he didn't let me sleep the whole night. Bring me a stone for a pillow."
He placed his burning hand in my palm.
"Brother Leo, my fellow voyager, fellow struggler: forgive me. . . ." Then he closed his eyes.
I went outside, sat down in front of the shelter, and wept-- softly, with stifled sobs, lest he hear. Sister Clara came up to me.
"What can we do, Brother Leo? How can we keep him alive?"
"He doesn't want to stay alive, Sister Clara. He says the ascent is finished. Its peak is crucifixion, and he was crucified. Now he's waiting impatiently for only one thing: resurrection."
"And that means death, doesn't it, Brother Leo?"
"Yes, it means death."
Sister Clara sighed and bowed her head. Then, after a moment:
"Perhaps the goldfinch will keep him alive a little while longer. Did it sing all day yesterday?"
"No, Sister Clara. I imagine it was frightened."
"As soon as it gets over its fear and begins to sing, perhaps Father Francis will stop wanting to die so quickly."
I said nothing, but I knew extremely well that Francis was able to hear another, much sweeter song, an immortal warbling which came from far above the clouds, far above the stars, and which was calling him. His soul had already opened its cage in order to depart: to depart so that it could join the celestial choir.
On the third day his fever reached its height. His pale cheeks reddened; his lips became parched. He sprang up continually because in his delirium he kept seeing invisible presences. Suddenly he addressed me. It was nearly dawn.
"Brother Leo, where are you? I don't see you."
"Here at your side, Father Francis. Command me."
"Have you your quill and ink with you?"
"Always, Father Francis! Command me."
"Write!"
He had riveted his eyes upon the air and was trembling from his haste to dictate in time, before the vision left him.
"I'm listening, Father Francis."
"Write: I am a reed that bends in God's wind. I wait for Death, the Great Troubadour, to come and harvest me, cut holes in me, turn me into a fife. Thus, pressed between his lips, I shall go about singing in God's immortal reed-bed."
He sank down onto the mattress and lay still, face up, eyelids closed. But just as I was rising in order to extinguish the lamp so that it would not hurt his eyes, suddenly he sat up again.
"Brother Leo!" he called at the top of his lungs as though shouting for help, "Brother Leo, write: "The black Archangel took me by the hand. 'Where are we going?' I asked. 'We are leaving the earth behind us,' he answered, placing his finger upon his lips. 'Close your eyes so that you will not see it and begin to shed tears.'
"I set sail," Francis continued without a pause. "Behind me was the green earth, in front of me the black endless sea, while above, in the heavens, the north star sped forward like a meteor. Lord, Thou hast my heart in Thy hand; Thou showest it the way, and it sails onward. Already the first bird of Paradise is visible."
His eyes were burning, his entire body pulsating. I waited, holding the quill in the air.
"Write! Where are you, Brother Leo? Write:
"When the Archangel expelled Adam and Eve from Paradise, our two Parents sat down on a clod of earth, neither of them speaking. The sun went down. The night rose from the earth filled with terror, descended from the sky filled with terror; a biting wind began to blow, and Eve snuggled against her husband's breast to grow warm. As soon as she felt better she clenched her small newborn fist, opened her mouth, and said, 'Thy will not be done, horrible old man!' "
Francis laughed. Doubtlessly he saw the First Creatures in the air before him, with Eve squeezing her newborn fist and threatening. But in the midst of his laughter, he was overcome with tears.
"Are you still here, Brother Leo? Write: "It was spring when the Archangel Gabriel came down to earth. What he saw frightened him. The earth is exceedingly beautiful--the hussy! he said to himself; I had better not stay very long! A carpenter ran out of his shop. 'This is Nazareth, my child,' he said. 'What are you looking for?' 'Mary's house.' The carpenter began to tremble. 'And why do you have that cross in your hand, and those nails, and the blood?' 'This isn't a cross, it's a lily.' 'Who sent you?' 'God.' A knife turned in the carpenter's heart. All is finished! he said to himself as he opened his door, revealing a small courtyard, a well, some basil in a flowerpot, and next to the well, a girl sewing an infant's tiny gown. The Archangel hesitated for a moment on the threshold, his eyes filled with tears."
Francis' eyes filled with tears also, just like the Archangel's. He sighed; his heart was breaking in two.
"Poor, poor Mary," he murmured, "poor, sweet little mother whose beloved child was robbed by death. . . . Lord, if all the tears that men shed in a single year flowed at the same time, they would form a river that would engulf Thy house. But Thou art omniscient, and thus Thou makest them flow one by one."
Thes
e words frightened him, and as soon as he had uttered them he implored me not to write them down. "They were words of the devil," he said. "If you have already written them, Brother Leo, cross them out--please!"
After a pause, he continued: "I still have one tiny song remaining in my heart, Brother Leo. I don't want to take it with me to the grave, so lift your quill, and write:
"When God had finally completed the creation of the world and had washed the mud off his hands, He sat down beneath one of the trees in Paradise, and closed his eyes. 'I am tired,' He murmured; 'why shouldn't I rest for a minute or two?' He commanded sleep to visit him; but at that instant a goldfinch with red claws came, perched above Him, and began to cry. 'There is no rest, no peace; do not sleep! I shall sit above Thee night and day, crying, There is no rest, no peace; do not sleep! I will not allow Thee to sleep, for I am the human heart.' "
Francis fell down on his back, panting.
"How did you like it, Brother Leo?" he murmured.
I was at a loss. What could I say? How could the heart of man speak to God so impertinently?
Francis divined my thought, and smiled.
"Do not be afraid, little lion of God. Yes, man's insolence is limitless, but that is the way God created our hearts; that is just what He wanted them to do--to stand up to Him and resist!"
DURING THOSE DAYS at San Damiano's his body suffered more than it ever had before, but his soul had never been plunged in such profound beatitude. Although none of his five wounds bled any longer, the pains had begun to spread treacherously Within him. Blood flowed now only from his eyes: blood mixed with tears.
I spent the nights at his feet, lying awake with him, trying desperately to keep him from departing this world just yet. One day his ears ceased buzzing and he heard the goldfinch. He listened for a long time, his mouth hanging open, his eyes pinned on the cage. An expression of great rapture had spread across his face.
"What bird do I hear, what is this celestial music?" he asked me. "Are we in heaven already?"
He cocked his ear again and listened intently, his face constantly submerged in bliss.
"Oh, if you only knew what it was saying, Brother Leo!" he exclaimed joyously. "What a miracle is hidden within this tiny feathered breast!"
The goldfinch had grown accustomed to us now; each day it began to twitter at the very break of dawn. It would swell out its throat and fix its tiny round eyes on the light outside; and its beak would bleed, so extravagantly did the creature sing. Indeed, it became drunk with song. Sometimes it would stop abruptly and peck at the bars of its cage, overcome by a yearning to escape: it had just glimpsed a sparrow sitting in freedom on a branch outside, and it wished to join it. But before long it would hop back onto the strip of reed that was suspended in the middle of the cage, and resume its song. Lady Pica used to come secretly to observe her son through the slits in the wall of interwoven branches. She would gaze at him for a long time, her palm over her mouth, and would then return in silence to her cell. And Sister Clara passed many nights of vigil on the threshold of the shelter, not daring to enter. She heard the moribund's joyful verses, for Francis had lately given himself up to song. His soul was gleeful, just like the goldfinch, and the old troubadour lays he had sung beneath closed windows in his youth, when he spent the nights roaming the city with his friends, came once more to his lips.
"If only Brother Pacifico were here to play the lute for me," he said again and again. "He's right when he says the lute is man's angelic mouth, because surely when the angels speak they must fly in the air and converse in song."
One morning he sat up in bed and clapped his hands with elation. "Do you know what I've been thinking all night long, Brother Leo?" he shouted to me. "That every piece of wood is a lute or violin; that it has a voice and glorifies the Lord. . . . If you want my blessing, Brother Leo, bring me two pieces of wood."
I brought them. He placed the first on his shoulder and slid the other over it with rapid bowlike motions. Seated on his mattress, he played and sang endlessly, beside himself with joy. His eyes were closed, his head thrown back: he was in ecstasy.
"Do you hear the pieces of wood, do you hear them singing?" he asked me. "Listen!"
At first I heard nothing but the two sticks rubbing and grating against each other. But gradually my ear became attuned, my soul awoke, and I began to hear an infinitely sweet melody coming from the two dry branches. In Francis' hands the mute wood had become a viol.
"Do you hear, Brother Leo? Do you hear? Cast aside your mind and leave your heart free to listen. When a person believes in God there is no such thing as a mute piece of wood, or pain unaccompanied by exultation, or ordinary everyday life without miracles!"
One day as he was playing his viol his face suddenly grew dark, as though a dense shadow had fallen over him. He stared through the open door with protruding eyes and uttered a cry--whether a happy cry or a doleful one I could not tell, for that cry had within it all the joys and sorrows of mankind. I turned in order to discover who he had seen, who had caused the outcry. But there was no one outside. In the deserted convent garden the last leaves were falling to the ground, swept off their branches by a powerful wind. The nuns were gathered to hear Mass. They were like an assembly of birds, and we heard their tender voices chanting the Lord's praises. But in the distance, in every village house, the frightened dogs were barking.
"What did you see, Father Francis?" I asked. "Who did you see? Why did you cry out?"
It was some time before he answered me. He had abandoned the two pieces of wood on the bed, and was still staring outside with gaping eyes.
"Who is it?" I asked again. "What do you see?"
His lips were moving. "O Brother Death . . . Brother Death . . ." he murmured over and over again, his arms spread wide as though he wished to embrace the apparition.
I said nothing. I understood: he had seen the black Archangel. The dogs had seen him too; that was why they were so afraid. Going outside in order to hide my tears, I circled the hut, but found no one. The hibernal sun had freed itself from the clouds that morning and had dispelled the frost which lay over the plain, making the winter laugh like spring. The sisters emerged from the chapel, scattered throughout the cloister, and convened again in the refectory to eat their breakfast: a mouthful of bread and a cup of water. As soon as Sister Clara saw me, she came close and asked in an uneasy tone, "Why ace you weeping, Brother Leo? Father Francis--"
"Father Francis saw the black Archangel. He cried out, and then opened his arms to embrace him. . . ."
Sister Clara bit into the edge of her wimple to hold back her tears.
"What did he say? Was he glad?"
"I don't know, Sister Clara. He kept murmuring, 'O Brother Death, O Brother Death . . .' That was all."
"Listen, Brother Leo," she said, lowering her voice, "there's one thing I'm still afraid of. You must be careful, because the last few days some inquisitive, disquieting men have been prowling round the convent. Wild men! One of the sisters recognized them: she says they are bandits from Perugia. The people there must have learned that Father Francis is gravely ill and have decided to send these bandits to snatch him away from us. There's no need for me to tell you what having a saint means to a city in terms of wealth. So, Brother Leo, be careful!"
Hiding her face, she left me hastily and was engulfed by the church.
I'll send word to the bishop, I said to myself. I'll tell him to dispatch soldiers from Assisi to guard Francis.
When I entered the hut I found Francis sitting up on his mattress, his back against the wall. His face appeared tranquil and content.
"Fetch your quill, Brother Leo," he said, happy that I had come. "I want you to record my final instructions, a pastoral letter that is to be read by all the brothers and all the sisters no matter where they are. When you finish, I shall affix my seal: a cross."
I took up the quill and knelt down next to him. He began to dictate, calmly, slowly, weighing each word:
"My
brothers, my sisters: Today God sent his black Archangel to bring me the great invitation. I am departing. However, I could not bear the thought of going far from you without having first left you my final instructions. My children, may Poverty, Love, Chastity, and Obedience-- God's four great daughters--be with you now and evermore! You must not forget, not even for an instant, that the black Archangel is at your sides, has been at your sides from the very day of your birth--waiting! Each moment you must say, This is my last hour, let me therefore be prepared. . . . And take care never to place your faith in man, but only in God. The body sickens; death approaches. Friends and relatives lean over the patient and say to him, 'Put your house in order, distribute your wealth, for you are dying.' And the poor man's wife, children, friends, and neighbors crowd round him and pretend to be weeping; and he, deluded by their wailing and lamentations, calls up all his strength and says, 'Yes, I have placed myself, body and soul, in your faithful hands, together with all my belongings.' Then, without losing a moment, the friends and relatives summon the priest to come and administer the sacrament to him. 'Do you wish to do penance for all your sins?' asks the priest. 'Yes, I do,' he replies. 'Do you wish to restore all that you unlawfully seized during your lifetime?' 'No, I can't do that!' 'Why not?' 'Because I've given all to my family and friends.' With this he loses the power of speech, and dies without having redeemed his sins. Then the devil, who has been hovering all the while above the man's pillow, laughing uproariously, takes immediate possession of his soul and hurls it down into hell; and all his gifts, all the power, wealth, beauty, wisdom that he was so proud of--they all go to waste, plunging down with him into the abyss. Meanwhile the family and friends divide his goods, cursing him and saying, 'May his bones roast in tar and brimstone! He should have amassed more to leave to us.' And thus he is denied by both heaven and earth. What is left for him? The Inferno: there, in the boiling, bubbling tar, he is punished for all eternity.