Forest. Is the first word which appears to my mind when I think back of the long way to our meeting in Greifswald. The town of Greifswald has already for some time been a myth in my mind – several young people, German in origin, and crazy, I would say, came from Greifswald University having learned Latvian. This had seemed strange and slightly suspicious – why one should decide to learn the Latvian language – a language spoken by around two million people. One could find some historical excuse if dug under the surface of the present time. Thus Greifswald had become a sort of strange place where these people travel to learn my language. I would say, it is an exclusive choice.

Silva linguis. No matter how well we acquire some other language we are still mislead by the meanings of the same words. Listening to a text is a multifaceted experience – each listener having a different ear. Significant silva. My story like any other in this meeting was just a small tree in this forest of texts, some of them probably not even a tree, but a branch, fallen from a tree pine cone, or lichen closer to the ground.

Silva auream. Golden autumn this is how we call any landscape of gold-crying trees in Latvia, before everything becomes dark and bleak, and the hours of light – short. So it was already in the beginning of November in my country. But the long drive-way from Berlin to Greifswald was a rewind in time, back to the golden phase. We were driving through the fields, one could say – through the forest of fields or silva agri. They being scattered with deer and hawks, careless about our texts to be read, careless about the language, but certainly caring of forests and woods. Above their heads, and our heads, a forest of wind-mills, a futuristic silva. I looked at this future sight with awe and misery – there are probably some five or ten at most wind mills in the whole territory of my country, and I don't think it is particularly scarce, or slow development into the future. Entering the future cannot come faster than the future approaches. Or is it us who approach it? Anyway, here I am, driving through the fields of deer and the forest of wind-generators, and thinking of my story to be read. The story was written a few years ago. I was on another trip. Mountains that time. Silva montibus. Suddenly I remembered what I thought when I wrote it. I thought I just want to write it down, no squeezing of elaborate style or of great literary aim. That is what I thought. It could have been that way. Or it was slightly differently maybe. It was in the past, I don't remember it precisely. All the literature is a matter, which deals with the past, something which has already been, existed, been known, even when it deals with the future, it is rooted in the past.

So is my reflection on the meeting of texts and authors in Greifswald two months ago. It is the end of December, even bleaker and darker in my country. This morning the sun rose at 8.57, and it had already set at 15.42. And now there is silva tenebris and silva memorias.

December 17, 2017

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