Sprokkelmaand: Preface

Who are they?

Sprokkelmaand—a word that has now almost fallen into oblivion. I have put a number of them in the bath. The sample population consisted of boys from sixteen to sixty. Men who enjoy sex, of course adults, and who participated of their own free will.

Looking back, I find the harvest remarkable, although it was not exactly a triumphal procession. Not all the participants were pleasant, and some were frankly disappointing, but there were also some magnificent specimens among them.

A wise man from the coast was the first, a father worthy of honorable mention. Then came a Thai, a priest, a Chinese man. I had at least three Africans over to the house and into the bath—the darker the better. There was also someone from Ninove, someone who lived in a high-rise building, and there was an anonymous one with suction power ten, probably from the neighborhood of Uccle.

The one priest who made his way to the bathroom did not convince me, for his theology was very shaky. Like the others, he passed in review. “You have granted him his heart’s desire; what his lips have asked you have not denied him. For you came to meet him with blessings of sweetness.” Quoniam praevenisti eum in benedictionibus dulcedinis. Psalm 20:3–4.

They all took their place in the bathtub, except one. I did not dare pour water over him because I feared for the color of his hair. I am forgetting an elderly man from Ganshoren, for age is ultimately no issue. We all grow older.

If you wash away what is superfluous, you always find the boy beneath the crusts.

Photo: replica of Michelangelo’s David (Palazzo Vecchio – Florence).

Translator note: hesitations about the following word, (choice is yours) Original:
Sprokkelmaand: vooraf

Best literary English options:

• The Gleaning Month: Preface (most poetic)

• Gathering Month: Preface (most faithful)

February — The Gleaning Month: Preface (if clarity matters)

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