all you have been waiting

1 Sophia Trust not to appearances. JACOB CATS, Moral Emblems, 1632 We are eating dinner, my husband and I. A shred of leek is caught in his beard. I watch it move up and down as he chews; it is like an insect caught in the grass. I watch it idly, for I am a young woman and live simply, in the present. I have not yet died and been reborn. I have not yet died a second timefor in the eyes of the world this will be considered a second death. In my end is my beginning; the eel curls

round and swallows its own tail. And in the beginning I am still alive, and young, though my husband is old. We lift our wine flutes and drink. Words are etched on my glass: Mankinds hopes are fragile glass and life is therefore also short, a scratched homily through the sinking liquid. Cornelis tears off a piece of bread and dips it into his soup. He chews for a moment. My dear, I have something to discuss. He wipes his lips with his napkin. In this transitory life do we not all crave immortality? I freeze, knowing what is coming. I gaze at my roll, lying on the tablecloth. It has split, during baking, and parted like lips. For three years we have been married and I have not produced a child. This is not through lack of trying. My husband is still a vigorous man in this respect. At night he mounts me; he spreads my legs and I lie there like an upturned beetle pressed down by a shoe. With all his heart he longs for a sonan heir to skip across these marble floors and give a future to this large, echoing house on the Herengracht.

So far I have failed him. I submit to his embraces, of course, for I am a dutiful wife and shall always be grateful to him. The world is treacherous and he reclaimed me, as we reclaimed our country from the sea, draining her and ringing her with dykes to keep her safe, to keep her from going under. I love him for this. And then he surprises me. To this effect I have engaged the services of a painter. His name is Jan van Loos and he is one of the most promising artists in Amsterdamstill lifes, landscapes, but most especially portraiture. He comes on the recommendation of Hendrick Uylenburgh, who as you know is a discerning dealerRembrandt van Rijn, newly arrived from Leiden, is one of his protÃ©gÃ©s. My husband lectures me like this. He tells me more than I want to know but tonight his words land noiselessly around me. Our portrait is going to be painted! He is thirtysix, the same age as our brave new century.

Cornelis drains his glass and pours another. He is drunk with the vision of ourselves, immortalized on canvas. Drinking beer sends him to sleep, but drinking wine makes him patriotic. Ourselves, living in the greatest city, home to the greatest nation on the globe. It is only me sitting opposite him but he addresses a larger audience. Above his yellowed beard his cheeks are flushed. For doesnt Vondel describe Amsterdam thus? What waters are not shadowed by her sails? On which mart does she not sell her wares? What peoples does she not see lit by the moon, she who herself sets the laws of