<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=468501" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Gioconda And Si-Ya-U</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">to the memory of my friend SI-YA-U,<br> whose head was cut off in Shanghai</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A CLAIM</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Renowned Leonardo's<br>world-famous<br>&quot;La Gioconda&quot;<br>has disappeared.<br>And in the space<br>vacated by the fugitive<br>a copy has been placed.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The poet inscribing<br>the present treatise<br>knows more than a little<br>about the fate<br>of the real Gioconda.<br>She fell in love<br>with a seductive<br>graceful youth:<br>a honey-tongued<br>almond-eyed Chinese<br>named SI-YA-U.<br>Gioconda ran off<br>after her lover;<br>Gioconda was burned <br>in a Chinese city.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I, Nazim Hikmet,<br>authority<br>on this matter,<br>thumbing my nose at friend and foe<br>five times a day,<br>undaunted,<br>claim<br>I can prove it;<br>if I can't, <br>I'll be ruined and banished<br>forever from the realm of poesy.<br> <br> 1928</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Part One<br>Excerpts from Gioconda's Diary</div><div style="margin:10px 0">15 March 1924: Paris, Louvre Museum</div><div style="margin:10px 0">At last I am bored with the Louvre Museum.<br>You can get fed up with boredom very fast.<br>I am fed up with my boredom.<br>And from the devastation inside me<br> I drew this lesson;<br> to visit<br> a museum is fine,<br> to be a museum piece is terrible!<br>In this palace that imprisons the past<br>I am placed under such a heavy sentence<br>that as the paint on my face cracks out of boredom<br>I'm forced to keep grinning without letting up.<br>Because<br> I am the Gioconda from Florence<br>whose smile is more famous than Florence.<br>I am bored with the Louvre Museum.<br>And since you get sick soon enough <br> of conversing with the past,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I decided <br> from now on<br>to keep a diary.<br>Writing of today may be of some help<br> in forgetting yesterday...<br>However, the Louvre is a strange place.<br>Here you might find<br>Alexander the Great's<br> Longines watch complete with chronometer,<br> <br>but <br>not a single sheet of clean notebook paper<br>or a pencil worth a piaster.<br>Damn your Louvre, your Paris.<br>I'll write these entries<br> on the back of my canvas.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And so<br>when I picked a pen from the pocket<br>of a nearsighted American<br> sticking his red nose into my skirts<br>--his hair stinking of wine--</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> I started my memoirs.<br> <br>I'm writing on my back<br> the sorrow of having a famous smile...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>18 March: Night</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The Louvre has fallen asleep.<br>In the dark, the armless Venus<br> looks like a veteran of the Great War.<br>The gold helmet of a knight gleams<br>as the light from the night watchman's lantern <br> strikes a dark picture.<br> <br>Here<br> in the Louvre<br> my days are all the same<br> like the six sides of a wood cube.<br>My head is full of sharp smells<br> like the shelf of a medicine cabinet.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>20 March</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I admire those Flemish painters:<br>is it easy to give the air of a naked goddess<br> to the plump ladies<br>of milk and sausage merchants?<br>But<br> even if you wear silk panties,<br>cow + silk panties = cow.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Last night<br> a window <br> was left open.<br>The naked Flemish goddesses caught cold.<br>All day<br>today,<br> turning their bare<br>mountain-like pink behinds to the public,<br> they coughed and sneezed...<br>I caught cold, too.<br>So as not to look silly smiling with a cold,<br>I tried to hide my sniffles<br> from the visitors.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>1 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Today I saw a Chinese:<br> he was nothing like those Chinese with their topknots.<br>How long<br> he gazed at me!<br>I'm well aware<br> the favor of Chinese<br> who work ivory like silk<br> is not to be taken lightly...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>11 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I caught the name of the Chinese who comes every day:<br> SI-YA-U.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>16 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Today we spoke<br>in the language of eyes.<br>He works as a weaver days<br>and studies nights.<br>Now it's a long time since the night<br>came on like a pack of black-shirted Fascists.<br>The cry of a man out of work<br>who jumped into the Seine<br>rose from the dark water.<br>And ah! you on whose fist-size head<br> mountain-like winds descend,<br>at this very minute you're probably busy<br>building towers of thick, leather-bound books<br>to get answers to the questions you asked of the stars.<br>READ<br>SI-YA-U<br> READ...<br>And when your eyes find in the lines what they desire,<br> when your eyes tire,<br>rest your tired head<br> like a black-and-yellow Japanese chrysanthemum<br> on the books..<br> SLEEP<br> SI-YA-U<br> SLEEP...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>18 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I've begun to forget<br>the names of those Renaissance masters.<br>I want to see<br> the black bird-and-flower<br> <br> watercolors<br> that slant-eyed Chinese painters<br> <br> drip<br> from their long thin bamboo brushes.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NEWS FROM THE PARIS WIRELESS</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> <br> PARIS<br> PARIS<br> PARIS...<br> <br>Voices race through the air<br> like the fiery greyhounds.<br>The wireless in the Eiffel Tower calls out:<br> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> <br> PARIS<br> PARIS<br> PARIS...<br> <br>&quot;I, TOO, am Oriental -- this voice is for me.<br>My ears are receivers, too.<br>I, too, must listen to Eiffel.&quot;<br>News from China<br> News from China<br> News from China:<br>The dragon that came down from the Kaf mountains<br> has spread his wings<br>across the golden skies of the Chinese homeland.<br>But<br>in this business it's not only the British lord's<br>gullet shaved<br> like the thick neck<br> of a plucked hen<br>that will be cut<br>but also<br> the long<br> thin<br> beard of Confucius!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM GIOCONDA'S DIARY</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>21 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Today my Chinese<br> looked my straight <br> in the eye<br>and asked:<br>&quot;Those who crush our rice fields<br> with the caterpillar treads of their tanks<br>and who swagger through our cities<br> like emperors of hell,<br>are they of YOUR race,<br> the race of him who CREATED you?&quot;<br>I almost raised my hand<br> and cried &quot;No!&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>27 April</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Tonight at the blare of an American trumpet<br>--the horn of a 12-horsepower Ford--<br> I awoke from a dream,<br>and what I glimpsed for an instant<br> instantly vanished.<br>What I'd seen was a still blue lake.<br>In this lake the slant-eyed light of my life<br> had wrapped his fingers around the neck of a gilded fish.<br>I tried to reach him,<br>my boat a Chinese teacup<br>and my sail<br> the embroidered silk<br> of a Japanese<br> bamboo umbrella...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>NEWS FROM THE PARIS WIRELESS</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> HALLO<br> <br> PARIS<br> PARIS<br> PARIS<br> <br>The radio station signs off.<br>Once more<br> blue-shirted Parisians<br> fill Paris with red voices<br> and red colors...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM GIOCONDA'S DIARY</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>2 May</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Today my Chinese failed to show up.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>5 May</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Still no sign of him...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>8 May</div><div style="margin:10px 0">My days<br> are like the waiting room<br> of a station:<br>eyes glued<br> to the tracks...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>10 May</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Sculptors of Greece,<br>painters of Seljuk china,<br>weavers of fiery rugs in Persia,<br>chanters of hymns to dromedaries in deserts,<br>dancer whose body undulates like a breeze,<br>craftsman who cuts thirty-six facets from a one-carat stone,<br>and YOU<br> who have five talents on your five fingers,<br> master MICHELANGELO!<br>Call out and announce to both friends and foe:<br>because he made too much noise in Paris,<br>because he smashed in the window<br> of the Mandarin ambassador,<br> Gioconda's lover<br> has been thrown out<br> of France...<br> <br>My lover from China has gone back to China...<br>And now I'd like to know<br>who's Romeo and Juliet!<br>If he isn't Juliet in pants<br> and I'm not Romeo in skirts...<br>Ah, if I could cry--<br> if only I could cry...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>12 May</div><div style="margin:10px 0"> Today<br> when I caught a glimpse of myself<br> in the mirror of some mother's daughter<br>touching up the paint<br> on her bloody mouth<br> in front of me,<br> the tin crown of my fame shattered on my head.<br>While the desire to cry writhes inside me<br> I smile demurely;<br>like a stuffed pig's head<br> my ugly face grins on...<br> Leonardo da Vinci,<br> may your bones<br> become the brush of a Cubist painter<br>for grabbing me by the throat -- your hands dripping with paint --<br>and sticking in my mouth like a gold-plated tooth<br>this cursed smile...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Part Two<br>The Flight</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Ah, friends, Gioconda is in a bad way...<br>Take it from me,<br> if she didn't have hopes<br> of getting word from afar,<br>she'd steal a guard's pistol,<br> and aiming to give the color of death<br>to her lips' cursed smile,<br> she'd empty it into her canvas breast...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM GIOCONDA'S DIARY</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>O that Leonardo da Vinci's brush<br>had conceived me<br> under the gilded sun of China!<br>That the painted mountain behind me<br>had been a sugar-loaf Chinese mountain,<br>that the pink-white color of my long face<br> could fade,<br>that my eyes were almond-shaped!<br>And if only my smile<br> could show what I feel in my heart!<br>Then in the arms of him who is far away<br> I could have roamed through China...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>I had a heart-to-heart talk with Gioconda today.<br>The hours flew by<br> one after another<br>like the pages of a spell-binding book.<br>And the decision we reached<br>will cut like a knife<br> Gioconda's life<br> in two.<br>Tomorrow night you'll see us carry it out...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>The clock of Notre Dame <br> strikes midnight.<br> <br>Midnight<br> midnight.<br>Who knows at this very moment<br> which drunk is killing his wife?<br>Who know at this very moment<br> which ghost<br> is haunting the halls<br> of a castle?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Who knows at this very moment<br> which thief<br> is surmounting<br> the most unsurmountable wall?<br> <br>Midnight... Midnight...<br>Who knows at this very moment...<br>I know very well that in every novel<br> this is the darkest hour.<br> <br>Midnight<br> strikes fear into the heart of every reader...<br>But what could I do?<br>When my monoplane landed<br> on the roof of the Louvre,<br>the clock of Notre Dame<br> struck midnight.<br>And, strangely enough, I wasn't afraid<br>as I patted the aluminum rump of my plane<br> and stepped down on the roof...<br>Uncoiling the fifty-fathom-long rope wound around my waist,<br>I lowered it outside Gioconda's window<br>like a vertical bridge between heaven and hell.<br>I blew my shrill whistle three times.<br>And I got an immediate response<br>to those three shrill whistles.<br>Gioconda threw open her window.<br>This poor farmer's daughter<br> done up as the Virgin Mary<br>chucked her gilded frame<br>and, grabbing hold of the rope, pulled herself up...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">SI-YA-U, my friend,<br> you were truly lucky to fall<br>to a lion-hearted woman like her...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM GIOCONDA'S DIARY</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>This thing called an airplane<br> is a winged iron horse.<br>Below us is Paris<br> with its Eiffel Tower--<br> a sharp-nosed, pock-marked, moon-like face.<br>We're climbing,<br> climbing higher.<br>Like an arrow of fire<br> we pierce<br> the darkness.<br>The heavens rise overhead,<br> looming closer;<br>the sky is like a meadow full of flowers.<br> We're climbing,<br> climbing higher.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">.................................. .................<br> ................................................. ..<br>........................................... ........</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>I must have dozed off --<br> I opened my eyes.<br>Dawn's moment of glory.<br>The sky a calm ocean,<br>our plane a ship.<br>I call this smooth sailing, smooth as butter.<br>Behind us a wake of smoke floats.<br>Our eyes survey blue vacancies<br> full of glittering discs...<br>Below us the earth looks<br> like a Jaffa orange<br> turning gold in the sun...<br>By what magic have I<br> climbed off the ground<br> hundreds of minarets high,<br>and yet to gaze down at the earth<br> my mouth still waters...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Now our plane swims<br> within the hot winds<br> swarming over Africa.<br>Seen from above,<br> Africa looks like a huge violin.<br>I swear<br>they're playing Tchaikovsky on a cello<br> on the angry dark island<br> of Africa.<br>And waiving his long hairy arms,<br> a gorilla is sobbing...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>We're crossing the Indian Ocean.<br>We're drinking in the air<br> like a heavy, faint-smelling syrup.<br>An keeping our eyes on the yellow beacon of Singapore<br>-- leaving Australia on the right,<br> Madagascar on the left --<br>and putting our faith in the fuel in the tank,<br> we're heading for the China Sea...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br> From the journal of a deckhand named John aboard a <br>British vessel in the China Sea</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>One night<br> a typhoon blows up out of the blue.<br>Man,<br> what a hurricane!<br>Mounted on the back of yellow devil, the Mother of God<br> whirls around and around, churning up the air.<br>And as luck would have it,<br> I've got the watch on the foretop.<br>The huge ship under me<br> looks about this big!<br>The wind is roaring<br> blast<br> after blast,<br> blast<br> after blast...<br>The mast quivers like a strung bow.(*)<br> *[What business do you have being way up there?<br> Christ, man, what do you think you are-a stork? <br> N.H.]</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oops, now we're shooting sky-high --<br> my head splits the clouds.<br>Oops, now we're sinking to the bottom --<br> my fingers comb the ocean floor.<br>We're learning to the left, we're leaning to the right --<br>that is, we're leaning larboard and starboard.<br>My God, we just sank!<br> Oh no! This time we're sure to go under!<br>The waves<br>leap over my head<br> like Bengal tigers.<br>Fear<br> leads me on<br> like a coffee-colored Javanese whore.<br>This is no joke -- this is the China Sea... (*)<br> *[The deckhand has every right to be afraid.<br> The rage of the China Sea is not to be taken lightly. <br> N.H.]</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Okay, let's keep it short.<br>PLOP...<br>What's that?<br>A rectangular piece of canvas dropped from the air<br> into the crows nest.<br>The canvas<br> was some kind of woman!<br>It struck me this madame who came from the sky<br> would never understand<br> our seamen's talk and ways.<br>I got right down and kissed her hand,<br> and making like a poet, I cried:<br>&quot;O you canvas woman who fell from the sky!<br>Tell me, which goddess should I compare you to?<br>Why did you descend here? What is your large purpose?&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She replied:<br>&quot;I fell<br> from a 550-horsepower plane.<br>My name is Gioconda,<br> I come from Florence.<br>I must get to Shanghai<br> as soon as possible.&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM GIOCONDA'S DIARY</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br> The wind died down,<br> the sea calmed down.<br>The ship makes strides toward Shanghai.<br>The sailors dream,<br> rocking in their sailcloth hammocks.<br>A song of the Indian Ocean plays<br> on their thick fleshy lips:<br>&quot;The fire of the Indochina sun<br>warms the blood<br> like Malacca wine.<br>They lure sailors to gilded stars,<br> those Indochina nights,<br> those Indochina nights.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Slant-eyed yellow Bornese cabin boys<br>knifed in Sigapore bars<br>paint the iron-belted barrels blood-red.<br>Those Indochina nights, those Indochina nights.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">A ship plunges on<br>to Canton,<br>55,000 tons.<br>Those Indochina nights...<br>As the moon swims in the heavens<br> like the corpse of a blue-eyed sailor<br> tossed overboard,<br>Bombay watches, leaning on its elbow...<br> Bombay moon,<br> Arabian Sea.<br>The fire of the Indochina sun<br>warms the blood<br> lie Malacca wine.<br>They lure sailors to gilded stars,<br> those Indochina nights,<br> those Indochina nights...&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Part Three<br>Gioconda's End</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>THE CITY OF SHANGHAI</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Shanghai is a big port,<br>an excellent port,<br>It's ships are taller than<br>horned mandarin mansions.<br>My, my!<br>What a strange place, this Shanghai...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">In the blue river boats<br>with straw sails float.<br>In the straw-sailed boats<br>naked coolies sort rice,<br> raving of rice...<br>My, my!<br>What a strange place, this Shanghai...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Shanghai is a big port,<br>The whites' ships are tall,<br>the yellows' boats are small.<br>Shanghai is pregnant with a red-headed child.<br>My, my!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Last night<br>when the ship entered the harbor<br>Gioconda's foot kissed the land.<br>Shanghai the soup, she the ladle,<br>she searched high and low for her SI-YA-U.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>&quot;Chinese work! Japanese work!<br>Only two people make this --<br>a man and a woman.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Chinese work! Japanese work!<br>Just look at the art<br>in this latest work of LI-LI-FU.&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Screaming at the tip of his voice,<br>the Chinese magician<br> LI.<br>His shriveled yellow spider of a hand<br>tossed long thin knives into the air:<br>one<br> one more<br> one<br> one more<br> five<br> one more.<br>Tracing lightning-like circles in the air,<br>his knives flew up in a steady stream.<br>Gioconda looked,<br> she kept looking,<br> she'd still be looking<br>but, like a large-colored Chinese lantern,<br> the crowd swayed and became confused:<br>&quot;Stand back! Gang way!<br>Chiang Kai-shek's executioner<br> is hunting down a new head.<br>Stand back! Make way!&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">One in front and one close behind,<br>two Chinese shot around the corner.<br>The one in front ran toward Gioconda.<br>The one racing toward her, it was him, it was him -- yes, him!<br>Her SI-YA-U,<br> her dove,<br> SI-YA-U...<br>A dull hollow stadium sound surrounded them.<br>And in the cruel English language<br> stained red with the blood<br> of yellow Asia<br> the crown yelled:<br>&quot;He's catching up,<br>he's catching up,<br> he caught-<br> catch him!&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Just three steps away from Gioconda's arms<br>Chiang Kai-shek's executioner caught up.<br>His sword<br> flashed...<br>Thud of cut flesh and bone.<br>Like a yellow sun drenched in blood<br>SI-YA-U's head<br> rolled at her feet...<br>And this on a death day<br>Gioconda of Florence lost in Shanghai<br>her smile more famous than Florence.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>A Chinese bamboo frame.<br>In the frame is a painting.<br>Under the painting, a name:<br> &quot;La Gioconda&quot;...<br>In the frame is a painting:<br> the eyes of the painting are burning, burning.<br>In the frame is painting:<br> the painting in the frame comes alive, alive.<br>And suddenly<br> the painting jumped out of the frame<br> as if from a window;<br> her feet hit the ground.<br>And just as I shouted her name<br>she stood up straight before me:<br> the giant woman of a colossal struggle.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">She walked ahead.<br> I trailed behind.<br>From the blazing red Tibetan sun<br>to the China Sea<br> we went and came,<br> we came and went.<br>I saw<br> Gioconda<br> sneak out under the cover of darkness<br>through the gates of a city in enemy hands;<br>I saw her<br>in a skirmish of drawn bayonets<br> strangle a British officer;<br>I saw her<br>at the head of a blue stream swimming with stars<br>wash the lice from her dirty shirt...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Huffling and puffling, a wood-burning engine<br>dragged behind it<br>forty red cars seating forty people each.<br>The cars passed one by one.<br>In the last car I saw her<br>standing watch:<br> a frayed lambskin hat on her head,<br> boots on her feet,<br> a leather jacket on her back...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTEBOOK</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Ah, my patient reader!<br>Now we find ourselves in the French<br>military court in Shanghai.<br>The bench:<br>four generals, fourteen colonels,<br>and an armed black Congolese regiment.<br>The accused:<br>Gioconda.<br>The attorney for the defense:<br>an overly razed<br>--that is, overly artistic--<br> French painter.<br>The scene is set.<br> We're starting.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>The defense attorney presents his case:</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>&quot;Gentlemen,<br>this masterpiece<br> that stands in your presence as the accused<br>is the most accomplished daughter of a great artist.<br>Gentlemen,<br> this masterpiece...<br>Gentlemen...<br>my mind is on fire...<br>Gentlemen...<br> Renaissance...<br>Gentlemen,<br> this masterpiece--<br> twice this masterpiece...<br>Gentlemen, uniformed gentlemen...&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">&quot;C-U-U-U-T!<br> Enough.<br>stop sputtering like a jammed machine gun!<br>Bailiff,<br> read the verdict.&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>The bailiff reads the verdict:</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>&quot;The laws of France<br> have been violated in China<br>by the above-named Gioconda, daughter of one Leonardo.<br>Accordingly,<br> we sentence the accused<br> to death<br> by burning.<br>And tomorrow night at moonrise,<br>a Senegalese regiment<br> will execute said decision<br> of this military court...&quot;</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>THE BURNING</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Shanghai is a big port.<br>The whites have tall ships,<br>the yellows' boats are small.<br>A thick whistle.<br> A thin Chinese scream.<br>A ship steaming into the harbor<br> capsized a straw-sailed boat...<br>Moonlight.<br>Night.<br>Handcuffed,<br> Gioconda waits.<br>Blow, wind, blow...<br>A voice:<br>&quot;All right, the lighter.<br>Burn, Gioconda, burn...&quot;<br>A silhouette advances,<br>a flash...<br>They lit the lighter<br>and set Gioconda on fire.<br>The flames painted Gioconda red.<br>She laughed with a smile that came from her heart.<br>Gioconda burned laughing...</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Art, Shmart, Masterpiece, Shmasterpiece, And So On,<br> And So Forth,<br> Immortality, Eternity-<br> H-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-Y...</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br> &quot;HERE ENDS MY TALE'S CONTENDING,<br> THE REST IS LIES UNENDING...&quot;<br> THE END</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br> Nazim Hikmet - 1929<br> <br> Trans. by Randy Blasing and Mutlu Konuk 1993</div><div style="margin:10px 0"></div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>FOOTNOTE: <br>GIOCONDA AND SI-YA-U: Si-Ya-U, Hsiao San (b. 1896), Chinese <br>revolutionary and man of letters. Hikmet met him in Moscow in 1922<br>and believed he had been executed in the bloody 1927 crackdown on <br>Shanghai radicals after returning to China via Paris in 1924, when the<br>Mona Lisa did in fact disappear from the Louvre. The two friends were<br>reunited in Vienna in 1951 and traveled to Peking together in 1952. <br>Translated into Chinese, this poem was later burned-along with Hsiao's<br>works- in the Cultural Revolution.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Nazim+Hikmet">Nazim Hikmet</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=468501" data-title="Gioconda And Si-Ya-U de Nazim Hikmet" data-description="to the memory of my friend SI-YA-U, whose head was cut off in Shanghai A CLAIM Renowned Leonardo's world-famous &quot;La Gioconda&quot; has disappeared. And in the space vacated by the fugitive a copy has been placed. The poet inscribing the p..."></div> </div> </div>

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