Robert-Edward Hart & TAREE MEETUN

Taaree Meetun only knew Robert-Edward Hart for a year. It was through her husband Jean, who was the steward of the poet. Just after her marriage, this resident of Rivière-des-Anguilles, converted to Catholicism and baptized Rose-Marie, moved to the outbuilding adjoining "La Nef", a house that the friend of the poet Emile Labat built. his hands from corals drawn from the Souillac lagoon, which Robert-Edward Hart cherished so much.

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Jean Meetun cleans, cooks and goes shopping for the poet. Rose-Marie is at first pleasantly surprised by Hart's good manners and simplicity. The daily routine of the poet is almost the same: he is standing at 5:30 and goes out on the veranda which is almost the tour of "La Nef" to contemplate the sea and meditate under the badamier.

The noise prevents him from concentrating. Sometimes he takes a break and will stretch his legs on the beach before returning to "La Nef" and put back on his Corona to type everything that goes through his head.

Late-night, he cannot bear to be awakened at four o'clock by the rooster's singing and the cackling of hens fed by Rose-Marie. He is also angry when Jean Meetun, sent to the store, and takes time to come back. If it is Jean Meetun who prepares the poet's meals, often composed of boiled vegetables - because of the amount of fat surrounding his heart - and sometimes of roast beef, he appreciates the coconut chatini he asks Rose- Mary to crush for him. It is also towards her that he turns when he suffers from the heart, desiring that she mass his bust. Although lonely, he regularly receives visits - Emile Labat and his daughter Blanche, Marcel Cabon, Malcolm de Chazal, a certain Mr. Tyack and many "mamzel ki vinn visit li e apré zot leu". He also writes to his two sisters and they visit him. His doctor comes weekly to consult him. Although he is playful, he also experiences moments of great sadness that do not escape Rose-Marie. And when the Meetun took a day off, the poet asked Abdool Raouf Fatemamode's mother to let the teenager sleep at home in case he felt sick. It is during these evenings that the teenager will see the poet tackle the painting of his self-portrait exposed since "La Nef" and even grab his violin to play a melancholy air.