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Chapter 7: Idyll on a Terrace
Explanation and Analysis—Dull Folly:
After their first meeting in Chapter 7, Ibarra and María Clara talk together on the porch. The narrator, apparently, has no ability to hear what they say. Or, perhaps, out of coyness, the narrator will not report to the reader what the couple is saying. Instead, the scene draws on personification:
Later, when the loving couple, fleeing the dust raised by Aunt Isabel's feather duster, went out to the terrace to chat freely amid the small grape arbors, what stories did they tell each other that made them tremble among their quiet whispers, little red flowers of angel hair? Tell them, you of fragrant breath and colorful lips, you, zephyr, who learned rare harmonies in the secret of the dark night and the mystery of our virgin forests, tell them, rays of sun, Eternity's shining embodiment on earth, sole unmatter in the world of matter, tell them, for I can offer but dull folly!
