爱华网系列专题：《点亮生活的智慧：人生之钥》
He took the baby in his arms, and for a short while they were together, the three of them, united by a sheer, ephemeral joy. “Will you call her Ann?” he said, handing her back. “Ann Margareta Maria.” He knew he would never see his daughter again. This was the moment he’d been holding on for. The baptism took place the day after his funeral. They gave her the names he had requested. Such was my entry to life, the heritage I carry. He was my father. And I was his last-born child. I found my neighbour in tears by her cattle-shed. She looked tired and dishevelled, her clothes were stained with mud and blood. “We lost the calf,” she wept in answer to my question. “A fine bull calf. Everything was perfect. The little hooves, tail, ears; teeth and all.”
Are calves born with teeth? I asked myself but I didn’t say so. I sympathised with her sadness, having once shed a few tears myself over a Charolais calf still-born for no better reason than the vet being out of reach. I remember the sight of the strong muscular body in its golden hide. The uncomprehending look of the mother as she licked him, expecting life. My neighbour was convulsed by a sob. “Such a beautiful creature – and only fit to be buried.” I thought of her forebears: generations of women in rural Ireland, some of them still living, who gave birth to still-born children because they didn’t have access to the medical services they required. Their babies were taken away in the dead of night to be buried by the men in unconsecrated ground: secret little graves, soon overgrown and forgotten. I imagined the depth of those mothers’ grief, the searing pain of loss; a nameless tragedy shared by no one. “Such beautiful creatures – and only fit to be buried.” And I wondered, would those women have wept over a calf? The closest I have ever come to the mystery of life: a Premature Baby Unit. Watching a tiny scrap of life in intensive care struggling in agony for each breath.
