[8] “Hell is the closest thing to
Paradise.” These were the words that Eve had whispered into my ear, when we had met
for the first time in the garden. And these were the words that resonated in my head,
louder and louder still, over and over again, as I plodded through the crowded streets of
the Sûq. Naked. Totally naked. But no one seemed to have noticed, and if
they did, no one seemed to have given a damn. And I didn’t care either way. I was in
a daze, and this was reflected in the way I walked. I walked as if I were drunk, wobbling
as I did, lurching forward, and to the sides, as if pushed by invisible malignant hands,
bumping into every man and woman that happened my way, my own hands intentionally
getting tangled with the veils of the women, pulling them off, throwing them to the
ground. And when this happened, I made certain that the women had a good look at my penis.
I had become a... flasher, to use that old American colloquialism. The promise of
eternal life will do that to you. I also intruded on people’s
conversations, whenever I saw any of them conversing, in the streets, or in the shops. I
simply plunged ahead, and stood right there, in the middle of the group, returning
uncomprehending gazes with a stupid smile, while shaking my head like an idiot. Occasionally, I volunteered comments as to
the topic of the conversation, that is before my presence had put an end to it. Helpful,
insightful comments, such as this: “On the authority of Fart son of Shithead, on the
authority of Fuck son of Whore, who heard it from his father, on the authority of his
grandfather, a companion of the Prophet’s companion Abû Uyayrah, who had heard it
directly from the Prophet’s very mouth: ‘Indeed, as our knowledge increases, so
does our folly.’ The Prophet has conveyed nothing but the truth from His Lord.”
End of conversation. End of gathering. Beginning of confusion. I was passing on the
legacy, what else can a messiah do? Then he came my way. A messenger of his Lady
Mary. Lady Mary, as in our Lady Mary of Magdalene? No, Lady Mary, as in our Lady Mary,
freaking Mother of God. She wanted to see me, you see, right away, if I didn’t mind,
for lunch. And I didn’t mind, why should I? I had nothing better to do, and I knew
that I might not have another chance to see her, for her name was not on the list, you
see. And so I followed the messenger as he guided
me through the maze of narrow streets and alleyways, all clean, all shining, heading
towards the supposed mother-of-it-all, right into her very bosom, as a, “Maryam
Maryamti...’Ayni Maryama...,” love-song replaced Eve’s words in my head. Remember the blonde, the unnatural blonde
that I had bumped into when I first came to this damned Sûq, knocking her veil off, and
watching her with astonishment as she had blown me a kiss? Well, that... blonde was Mary. “Well, well, well,” I said,
“look who’s here. Did you bring me here to give me another kiss, hmmm? Kissy,
kissy. Well, if that’s so, you should know then, that I won’t accept anything
other than a real kiss this time, and on the you-know-what.” And I held my penis,
that ancient symbol of male pride, in the palm of my hand, as I uttered my last words for
the rest of the day. “So be warned.” Then I remembered, I remembered what had
happened to me last time I stood naked in front of a woman, and I remembered as my brain
was overwhelmed by a sudden rush of apprehension and fear, and as the amaranthine scars that covered my chest, began to pulse and ache, I
remembered the feel of steel withdrawing from my body, and air flooding my veins. I
remembered the helplessness. I remembered the pain. I remembered my confusion as the Sûq
continued to unravel before my eyes wherever I turned. In short, I remembered everything
that I was trying to forget. I remembered the amused expression that had covered
Mary’s face when we had first met. That expression was still there. Mary, Mother of God, draped an ‘abayah
over my naked body, and guided me to a sofa in the center of the room that bore an uncanny
resemblance to my own quarters in Eve’s house. I sat on the edge of the sofa, feeling
too embarrassed to relax, much too aware of my own nakedness for comfort. Too visible, too
vulnerable, enfeebled, drained. Drained. And Mary stood before me sure, strong, and
amused. “Would you like some wine?” She
asked. That was the first time I heard her speak, her voice was melodious, yet stern, it
reminded me of Soeur Danielle’s voice, and that was the first time that anything had
reminded me of her. Not that there were any other similarities between the two, physical
ones at least, after all, Mary was wearing a traditional Indian costume, complete with a
sari, a rather opaque sari. And her belly-button was showing. I had never seen Soeur
Danielle’s belly-button, I hadn’t even seen her bare foot. “How about some water then?” Mary
was responding to my head signal. And as I nodded to consent to her second suggestion,
Mary pressed a button on a wall, and proceeded to sit by me on the sofa, and at angle, so
that she could still face me, pinning me down, as it were, with her gaze. Oh yes, a sense
of sarcasm did invade me at that instant, and it left in the next, as a prolonged silence
fell over the scene.
“...and it must be more difficult for
you especially, isn’t it? I mean here you are surrounded by people who made history,
and who are you? Well, you’re a nobody. I can put it more diplomatically, but it
would amount to the same thing, wouldn’t it? You are a nobody. And you can be
killed, that too is part of the difficulty, you are a mortal in a world of immortals. They
told you Thurayyâ is dead, didn’t they. Well, for all practical purposes she is,
that is for the duration of your stay here, but once you’re gone, or once you’re
dead, whichever comes first, she’ll be brought back to life. I know she will, this
has happened few times before, you know. I’ve been here long enough to witness
several examples of it. Eve should have told you all this. But she’d rather keep in
the dark, or haven’t you noticed?” The water was bitter, but... “...you might not even have the
potential to make history, and I don’t think you do to be honest. I don’t think
you’ll be brought back here after your death in the normal, or should I say mortal,
world. I think you were brought here as a sacrificial lamb, and believe me I have an
innate ability to identify potential sacrificial lambs. I think you were brought here to
die, to be killed.”...but I felt relaxed. “Ah. But this is all too
dreary...” Dreary or not, I was very relaxed. “We should talk about something
else...” But I didn’t feel like talking, I didn’t know what I felt like,
but I know I didn’t feel like talking. The water was bitter... “unless, of
course, you’re in the mood for something else, are you?” Am I? Am I what? What was she talking about?
The water was bitter, but I... I felt relaxed. Too relaxed, I had dropped my ‘abayah. “Well, you look like you are.” And
Mary dropped her sari, as she stood up and walked gingerly towards me, her now bare breast
pointing the way. The water was bitter, but Mary’s tits
tasted sweet in my mouth, and her hands felt good around my penis, and her lips, and her
tong, and... and I felt relaxed, too relaxed. I was lying
on the floor, but I could also have been floating in mid air and not known it. Mary’s
head was buried between my legs. Her hair making a tent over my penis, a tent that
continued to collapse and be erect, over and over, as the excitement within me grew, and
was never allowed to reach a climax. Then the tent became a spider, and the spider climbed
over my body, I could feel its wet and sericeous feet crawling over me, and when it
reached my face, I could see Mary’s head stuck to its abdomen, but only momentarily. Mary Mother of God continued its journey
upward, dragging her breast over my extended tong. The water was bitter, but Mary’s
labia tasted sweet in my mouth. Eventually that day, and like many a devout
Catholic, I hailed Mary quite a few times, that day. Quite a few times. The water was
bitter, very bitter, it was no ordinary water, perhaps it was holy water, perhaps it was
poisoned water. And perhaps it was ordinary water, and I was the one who was bitter. But
on the day-after, I could fairly assert that, if it weren’t for that water, I would
never have... fucked Mary Mother of God. But the day after would not come for a while, a
long while. The following was told to me by Mary, during
one of the intervals that separated our numerous...engagements. Or perhaps she told it
during the engagements themselves, I can’t really be sure, the water was too bitter,
and the flesh too sweet. “Are you familiar with the
Qur’anic narration of the conception of Jesus? Well, it goes something like
this:” Here I expected Mary to start singing, and tap-dancing all around me. But she
didn’t. She rather monologuized like all the rest. “And mention in the Book Maryam as she
withdrew herself from her family to an eastern place, where she secluded herself from
them. Then We, meaning God of course, sent unto her Our spirit, and it appeared before her
in the form of a well-made man. She said, that is I said: ‘I seek refuge from you in
the Mercy of God, I hope that you are
pious.’ He said: I am but a messenger from your Lord so that I can bestow upon you a
pure son.’ She said: ‘But how can I have a son, and no man has yet touched me,
and neither am I a whore?’ He said: ‘Thus spoke your Lord “It is for Me to
take care of this, and We shall make him a sign unto the people, and a mercy from us. It
is a foreordained matter.”’ The rest of this story is not
important, the rest of it is mythological garbage. What’s important is this: the
well-made man who came to give me a son, and the clear sexual implications of his
advances. Now how can Muslims read this passage and still believe in a virgin birth? It
baffles me, I tell you, it baffles me. I asked Muhammad about it, and all his companions,
I asked them if they indeed believed in a virginal conception of Jesus, and you know what
they did? They were amused. You see, they believed in a chaste conception, that is
a conception sanctioned by God, though out of wedlock. They believed that Mary had
intercourse with an angle who appeared before her in the form of a well-made man, his
semen entered her body and made her pregnant. You can’t get pregnant without semen,
it’s all over the Qur’an for Heaven’s sake, those wonderful descriptions of
the power of semen. And there is yet another important
consideration here. Muhammad wanted to reconcile Jewish and Christian arguments concerning
the person of Jesus. There was a lot of hostility between Jewish and Christian Arabs at
the time, especially in Yemen, and this was reflected in their theological debates
naturally. The Jews in their polemics called
Jesus a son of a bitch, so that the Christians had to affirm both his Godhead, and that of
his mother. The Christian of Arabia had to make me a part of the Trinity, so for them it
was: ‘in the name of the Father, the Mother, and the Holy Son.’ It makes much
more sense, don’t you think? So Muhammad’s argument in essence
was, there are no gods here, just good decent folk who followed God’s commandments.
No wonder the Jews and the Christians mocked him, they thought him naive, and how wrong
they were! They paid dearly for being wrong, some of them even with their lives. Muhammad
was a true peacemaker, he put his sword where his mouth was. But what’s really of importance
to me is this: both the Christians and the Muslims were wrong, it was a not a virginal
conception, and it was not a chaste conception. And the Jews were right in this, for all
the wrong reasons unfortunately, still they were right in this. Jesus was a son of a bitch, and I was a whore. I was a whore. I became a whore at an early age.
Poverty, you see, has a way of diluting, if not negating, all moral precepts. And my
family was poor. So my father decided to use me, and my sisters, yes I has sisters, to
supplement his income, he was a carpenter. We were in Egypt at the time. But I was never
any good at being a whore, I did not know how
to please men, all except for one, Joseph, a colleague of my father. So when I became pregnant, after three
years of whoredom, and when Joseph, whom I hadn’t seen for over a year, and who had
meanwhile rediscovered God and religion, heard of it, he proposed to me, and believe me
all the family, including me, were eager to accept. Oh, so eager we were married within a
week. We were married within a week, and
Joseph took me back to the Holy Land, for a fresh start on life. And none of us was of
noble descent by the way, we were all commoners. Nobility was imposed upon us long after
our death, as it is often the case, don’t you think?” Don’t you think? Asked Jibrîl.
Don’t you think? Asked Iblîs.
Yes, yes I think. I replied. And what do you think? Again asked
Jibrîl.
I think it was rape. That’s what I think. I replied.
There was something in the water. There must have
been. Perhaps there was. But what’s really
important now is this: how do you feel? Jibrîl was mimicking Mary, I noticed.
Sometimes it is difficult, even for me, to tell him and Iblîs apart.
I feel numb. I can’t feel a thing but numbness. I replied.
Perhaps, it’s all for the better.
Iblîs sounded sympathetic, see what I mean? It’s not easy telling these two apart.
Often when I try I turn up to be wrong, perhaps I’m always wrong, how could I be
sure? They can both as easily lie, as tell the truth. Oh, I know, I know, I had said
things to the contrary before, but I could have been wrong, couldn’t I? Yes, I could,
I was. Still, I had to listen to them whenever they
had something to say, they were my only true companions, for whatever happens to me,
happens to them as well. If I were raped, so were they.
Was this the first time that I was raped? It was my turn to ask the questions. Silence. Then, I don’t know. Said Jibrîl.
I don’t remember. Said Iblîs. Well, I stated,
perhaps it
doesn’t really matter. And how could it? My night a journey has just turned into an
ascension; after all, I’ve just fucked the very Mother of God, one would expect Him
to come protesting soon. Wouldn’t you Iblîs if I fucked your mother during a brief descent into the lowest
depths of Hell? Or was my ascension itself a
descent? A glimpse of the Moon is a glimpse
of... home. A trip to the Moon is a return. A dream of the Moon, when the only thing I can
do is to dream, is torture. I dreamed of the
Moon that night. Mary’s bed was too soft for dreams not to come. And Mary’s body
was too wet for me not to think of home, my parched home. There was no wetness there, no
wetness at all. Oh, how I missed my home! How I missed you... home! “We consummated our marriage when I was
nine years old, mere few weeks after I’d just had my first period.” ‘Ayesha
was a tall, and ample-figured woman, with long black hair, brown bovine eyes, and reddish
cheeks. She was exactly as I had imagined her to be, and as the historical records had
portrayed her. Except of course for the long blue jeans, and white semi-transparent shirt
that she wore. And her voice had a bitter-angry quality to it that often clashed with the
images that she was trying to convey. Or did it clash with the images that
were invading my mind at the time? Or was I the one who was bitter-angry in the mind? No
matter, I could feel the madness welling up again within me, a different sort of madness
than before, more stinging somehow, more possessive. I phased in and out of
‘Ayesha’s reality into an alternate universe, quiet though unstable, pulsating
in accordance to its own rhythm. Pulse one - The Wedding-Night: “It took Muhammad forever to get me wet
between my legs, and even when he eventually did, it was mostly saliva, his saliva. So it
wasn’t exactly a beautiful experience, hell no, it was the most painful experience of
my life. But then my mother had warned me that it would be, ‘first times,’ she
said, ‘always are.’ She was definitely right. Bearers of bad news often are
right, or haven’t you noticed?” Pulse two - The Groom: “Muhammad wasn’t a bad person
though, I didn’t mean to imply that at
all. He was a kind man, and he loved me dearly, and I returned his love, in time...in time.” Pulse three - The Harem: “...Among his living wives, I was the
most privileged. Yes privileged. Privileged enough to interrupt him as he spoke, to argue
with him, to yell in his face, to make him angry without fearing the consequences.
Privileged enough to race him across the desert’s sands, and beat him, and watch him
as he often had to stop, huffing and puffing like an old wolf struggling to catch his
breath. Yes, I was privileged, privileged enough to remain a child, although physically,
sexually, he had made me a woman.” Pulse four - The Ghost:
“...I couldn’t compete with the
memory of the dead Khadijah though, but most of the time I didn’t need to. The dead
cannot show, or bestow affection. But I could. And he needed my affection.” Pulse five - The Disappointment:
“...But I had become a woman,
nonetheless, and thrust upon me were all the duties associated with womanhood at the time,
including, and that was the most important duty of them all, in his and mine, the duty of
childbearing. And it is in this particular duty that I had failed him...failed us...” Pulse six - The Adjustment:
“But there was no blame between us,
just disappointment, and that sufficed. Do you understand? It sufficed.” Pulse seven - The Doubting Prophet:
“...and when the Lie was told, Muhammad
believed it, he dared to believe that I had
committed adultery, that was the first time that he let his insecurity show. So I had no
choice, if Muhammad himself doubted me, I had no choice. I had to refer the matter of my
innocence to God, to whatever demon that lurked within Muhammad and put the words of the
revelation in his heart, and soul...” Pulse eight - The Public Façade:
“That demon was part of Muhammad, the
doubter, so I expected to be condemned. Instead, the revelation that came exonerated me,
totally, fully, uncompromisingly. It was truly a miracle...” Pulse nine - The Private Front:
“But in private, there was no
exoneration, only forgiveness. Sometimes forgiveness is the cruelest thing you can do to
someone. And I had to live with it. I still do, after all this time.” Pulse ten - The Parting:
“Muhammad became increasingly jealous,
nonetheless, after the incident. And naturally the revelations reflected his jealousy, by
imposing the strictest of seclusion upon us, and by forbidding us to marry after his
death. And so when he lay dying on my bed, I was eighteen at the time, I knew exactly what
I had to do.” Pulse eleven - An Act of Despair:
“I lifted his robe, and gave myself a
last fuck. That was the natural thing to do, don’t you think?”
I felt the malady
within me growing,
a form of angst
within me growing.
I felt it gnawing,
gnawing
at my brain.
The facts were quite plain.
The facts were quite plain.
The facts were obvious.
I was collapsing.
I was imploding.
I was...dying.
Dying.
I could feel myself
driven
to die. Driven. I burst
forth into the raging streets of the Sûq, a madman, a creature of certainty. Faithful
again. But this time armed with a different faith, my strides widened, and multiplied as I
moved in the direction of Abû Qâsim’s mosque. A throwback. I hearkened upon earlier
times as I entered the mosque, my shoes nailed to my feet, striding on the luxurious
carpeting, ignoring the stupefied worshippers, and Khumeini’s smirks - Khumeini was
sitting by the niche, preaching his soul out - And I headed towards the door leading to
the minaret.
The vista that opened before me, as I stood
in the Caller’s Niche in the minaret, was narrow. All I could see was a distant
ground, a ground that I intended to color with my blood. I took a step. Then another. Then
I dove into the air. And there was a wheeze. Then a flutter. Then... silence.
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lust for salvation, Brother, as though it were a woman, and I - a man.
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