Next in sequence         Previous in sequence       Home         Pastel index

Artilleryman from Martinique
Jaffory Zacharie (from Grenevières)

This one comes from the golden Antilles, blessed land where nature hides her rough aspects and threats under greenery and flowers. But when her fury awakes she knows in a few hours how to turn a joyful landscape into a nightmare. All the inhabitants of Martinique have memories of the shocking impression of Mount Pelée, suddenly awakened, reducing the happy island to a field of death (see in Wikipedia). Yet the people who live under these skies seem made for a carefree life. Visions of horror should not pass before their childlike eyes, their fleshy lips seem made for drinking in greedily all the pleasures of life. But their country, in spite of the catastrophe, remains shining and covered in flowers. Their exile seems hard, and in the feezing nights of the war their nostalgia remains for the warm perfumed sky where shivers of tenderness pass.