April had come to an end and Farrokhlaqa had not yet written a poem.
One Friday morning there was an unexpectedly large influx of guests at the villa, much larger than ever before, somewhere near one hundred people. In her frenzy, Farrokhlaqa put Munis and Fa’iza to work and started desperately looking for Zarrinkolah. She felt a rush of resentment toward her for not pulling her weight, not earning her keep. Then she suddenly saw the gardener among the crowd.
“For God’s sake,” she yelled at him, “tell your wife to come and give the women a hand in the kitchen. They are crushed under the pressure of work.”
“That’s not possible,” said the gardener calmly. “She became pregnant last night and she is not supposed to move for the next nine months.”
“You idiot!” she burst out in a fit of anger. “First of all, how do you know she became pregnant last night? Secondly, what the hell am I going to do with all these guests?”
“Don’t fret,” said the gardener, unperturbed. “I will have the tree sing. That will calm them, and make them forget their hunger. You can keep the food for yourself. Also, do not invite any more guests until you have produced some poetry. What is the use of them imposing on your hospitality without doing you any good?”
As soon as the gardener left, singing could be heard in the garden. The guests fell silent, transfixed where they were. It was as if they were all encased in a drop of water the size of an ocean. Slowly seeping through the layers of the earth, the drop joined a myriad of elements at the earth’s inner core in a dance, a perpetual, harmonic movement with no beginning or end. It was simultaneously slow and rapid. The guests’ arms lifted and began to swing overhead, hanging like ropes from the sky, moving so quickly they appeared as a shadow.
“Notice how much sky is around us,” Munis whispered in Farrokhlaqa’s ear. “There is a sky within a sky, within a sky . . .” Farrokhlaqa noted that the woman had closed her eyes, as if gazing at a distant horizon behind her eyelids. Farrokhlaqa crossed her legs and with a peculiar delight surveyed her guests, who were dazed by their experience and trying to understand it.
Then a green mist set in, engulfing everything and everyone—one color of the rainbow dominating all other colors. All who were present were dissolved into the mist, and then dripped like dewdrops from the tip of a leaf.
At nightfall the tree stopped singing. The guests left the garden noiselessly, wordlessly, entranced by the song they had heard.
Farrokhlaqa stopped inviting guests to the villa. She vowed not to invite anyone until she had written some poetry. She would confine herself to the music room all day and try to compose verse. Munis spent most of her time with the gardener and his wife, who from the beginning of her pregnancy had stopped speaking. She would sit by the window and watch the river silently. Munis and the gardener continued to collect dewdrops to irrigate the tree, as they diligently cared for Zarrinkolah in her delicate condition. As her pregnancy advanced and the contour of her body changed, Zarrinkolah became increasingly translucent, like crystal, with light shining through her. Munis would sometimes look at the river through her as she sat by the window watching the currents.
At the other end of the garden Fa’iza had been left alone. There were no more guests to cook for and receive compliments from on her culinary skills. Farrokhlaqa kept herself in isolation in the music room. Munis had practically moved to the gardener’s lodge and rarely stayed in the villa. Fa’iza could not have a conversation even with the gardener, as he was always busy doing something. She felt lonely and desolate. Occasionally she would get dressed and take a day trip to Tehran. In those excursions she would meander past Amir Khan’s house. On chance encounters, they would acknowledge each other only by a nod of the head.
It was late September when Farrokhlaqa felt she had gained some virtuosity in manipulating rhyme and rhythm in her poetry. She emerged from the room and sat on the bedstead near the pool. She called to Munis, who was watering the flowerbeds, to listen to her latest composition.
“Munis dear,” she said, “this is not really a poem as such, but I think if I continue to work on it, I will have a real one in a couple of years.” Munis encouraged her to read it.
“Like I said,” Farrokhlaqa demurred, “this is not really a poem, just an experiment with rhyme and meter.” Munis insisted.
Flushed with a mixture of excitement and diffidence, Farrokhlaqa began the recitation:“O sugar bowl, of sugar deprived, O anvil without a cobbler
O mirthless laughter, O wall climber who art a wobbler
O angel jocund, O giver of justice, serpent-hearted, beach-combing
O coquettish one, fairy-like, or a pigeon homing
O thou of shattered wing and broken claw
O giver of comfort, all goodness and no flaw.
Didst thou pack, leave, and not see
In the mirror of thy heart a picture of poor me?
What to expect of this sorrow-laden abode of the insane?
What to tell the lifeless simian remains of the one in pain?
A sadness covers my heart, say not again of war;
O generous one, tell my heart to beat no more.
Fari’s4 heart is depressed as a ruined temple,
Longing for the beloved, pure and simple.”
Farrokhlaqa fell silent, looking anxiously at Munis, who lowered her head, staring at her toes. Farrokhlaqa broke the awkward silence.
“What do you think?” she asked. “I know it is full of problems and infelicities. But I have never written a poem. This is my first completed one.”
“Let me read it myself,” Munis said finally. “I don’t quite understand it this way.”
Farrokhlaqa gave her the sheet of paper. Munis began reading silently, with concentrated attention. Farrokhlaqa was frantic with anticipation. She didn’t think much of Munis as a poetry critic, but she was a reader after all and had some literary sensitivities. In her anxiety Farrokhlaqa flitted her glance from the pool to the trees and from the trees to the pool.
“Excuse me,” Munis finally said, “Why do you begin the poem with ‘sugar bowl, of sugar deprived?’”
As if expecting the question, Farrokhlaqa beamed with a smile. “You see,” she said, “ I am fascinated with objects and I have looked at sugar bowls often. Don’t you think an empty sugar bowl looks very sad?” Munis nodded in agreement. “That may be so,” she went on. “But ‘an anvil without a cobbler’ sounds strange. Isn’t an anvil associated with blacksmiths?”
Farrokhlaqa was taken aback by the observation. She wanted to argue the point but she wasn’t quite sure herself.
“Are you certain?” she asked.
“As far as I know,” Munis answered.
“So what is the term for the one used by cobblers?” Munis could not think of it, despite her fairly extensive vocabulary.
“If I change it to ‘blacksmith,’” Farrokhlaqa mused, “the whole structure of the poem will shift.”
“That may not be a bad thing,” Munis said. “The way it is, some of the rhymes don’t make sense. Perhaps you can restructure the poem around the concept of ‘blacksmith.’ Some of the other concepts, for instance ‘serpent-hearted’ or ‘simian remains,’ do catch the reader’s attention, but they don’t make much sense. Perhaps they’ll fit better with ‘blacksmith.’”
Farrokhlaqa’s morale was already undermined. Munis could see that Farrokhlaqa was seeing in her mind’s eye the destruction of her dream castle brick-by-brick.
“Don’t fret too much about poetry,” Munis said sympathetically. “There are other means of success. I’m thinking of the painter who visited here last time. I can see that he is dying to paint a portrait of you. Let him do it and then pay him generously. The word will get around and catch the attention of the movers and shakers. You are already connected with some of them. Just approach them sincerely and tell them you want to be in the parliament. They’ll help you.”
Munis sensed that Farrokhlaqa had stopped taking down her dream ca
stle and was already considering the proposed strategy.
“I think I’ll start a new series of parties from next week,” she said resolutely. “I will call up Mosayeb and Ahmad as we’ll need man servants to do the work.”
As planned, the parties started the following week. Gradually relatives began showing up among the guests, including Amir Khan, who came under the pretext of visiting his sister. He was subdued and restrained—and unaccompanied by his wife.
“Why didn’t you bring your wife?” Fa’iza asked pointedly.
“She is too busy,” he said. “Besides, she is not into socializing. She is a homemaker, born to keep house.”
“I can’t say I approve of full-time homemakers,” Fa’iza returned. “A woman must have a social dimension, to help her man advance socially. One can’t get stuck in the kitchen corner. For example, you don’t plan to remain a low-grade employee forever. You want to advance yourself to higher positions in your organization. The way to do it is to network with important people. I have lost count of the number of important people I’ve gotten to know so far. I just have to drop a hint and any problems I may have will be taken care of.”
“Do you happen to know Mr. Atrchian?” asked Amir Khan, brimming with anticipation, “the one who was here last week? You know, bald, short, his face always flushed?”
“Of course,” she answered emphatically, insinuating a need for confidentiality. “He and Mr. Manaqebi smoke opium together.”
Amir Khan seemed delighted with the answer. He had brought up the man’s name with Fa’iza before. But pointedly she never asked why he was interested; she did not want to serve as a go-between.
Farrokhlaqa had agreed to model for the painter. In addition to Fridays he also came on Tuesdays to work on the portrait. The plan was to have an exhibition, richly financed by Farrokhlaqa, consisting of various sketches the painter had made of her in preparation for the portrait.
Munis continued to spend most of the day at the end of the garden helping the gardener collect dewdrops for the tree. Mosayeb and Ahmad took full charge of the kitchen, obviating the need for the women in catering chores. With the approach of the winter season Farrokhlaqa was thinking of getting rid of the women. Now she knew how to manage her affairs. The exhibition was to open in late January, and she was thinking of leasing a house in Tehran. The garden in Karadj would be her summer residence. She saw no place for women in this scheme.
One night in mid-January the garden was flooded with a mysterious luminescence. Munis, who was sleeping close to the window in the villa, was awakened by it. “She is giving birth,” she muttered to herself. Hurriedly, she put on some clothes and headed for the lodge. A heavy snow had fallen through the night and had covered the garden, diffusing the light in all directions, as though the whole universe was aglow.
Zarrinkolah was now a figure of clear crystal, refracting the light in many colors. The gardener, seemingly unconcerned, was sitting on the floor mending his slippers.
“We must help her,” Munis yelled at him.
“She does not need help,” said the gardener. “A true woman gives birth by herself.”
Just before dawn a morning glory came into the world.
The gardener gathered it in his cupped hands and headed toward the riverbank, where he had already dug a small pit in the sand. It was full of frozen snow. Gently, he placed the seedling on the ice.
“It’s going to freeze,” groaned Munis.
“It will not die. It will grow roots and prosper.”
They returned to the room. Zarrinkolah was sitting silently in the middle of her bed. She was no longer crystalline. She had turned into her former self, her breasts swollen with milk. The gardener embraced her tenderly. He kissed her forehead and her hands, gently stroking her hair. He then bent down and massaged her feet.
“We must now feed the tree,” said the gardener solemnly, handing a cup to his wife. She expressed her milk in the cup, filling it to the brim.
“Now, go to sleep,” he said to his wife, “a restful sleep.”
He picked up the cup and with Munis walked to the tree. Turning to Munis, he said, “It is frozen into a sleep. It is good that it is hibernating. By the spring it will be a tree like you’ve never seen before.”
Drop by drop, he spread the milk around the trunk of the tree. By the time he finished, the sun had risen and they returned to the lodge. Munis picked her way slowly through the wintry garden toward the house. She had a sense that she had died again, since nothing seemed strange to her anymore. Somewhere along the way she stopped by a tree and leaned her head against its rough trunk. “I need help,” she told herself.
In a way, she envied the prostitute. The prostitute had won too easily, having achieved the sanctity of light, as spontaneously and effortlessly as laughing. Munis could not penetrate this mystery.
“How can I turn into light?” she moaned.
There was no answer.
She lacked the potential to become a tree; it wasn’t in her nature. She was not fertile either. She knew that she was rotting from within. She knew that what led to the clarity of light was love, something she had never experienced in her life. She had progressed to the edge of wonderment, but love was oceans away. She knew that love would come if she could sincerely feel the essence of a tree past the roughness of its bark. But always, the physical sensation of the roughness interrupted her. She always knew the malice of humankind, without herself being in its possession. She had not learned to be malicious. She only knew malice.
In a deserted stretch of the Karadj highway Munis had come face-to-face with unbridled lust, although she knew what lust was before being touched by it. The problem was that she had an unbounded awareness of things, an awareness that instilled undue caution in her, making her fearful that action would lead to ignominy, humiliation. This created in her a desire to be ordinary, average. Yet she did not truly know what it meant to be ordinary. She did not know that it meant not loving an earthworm, not genuflecting at the altar of withered leaves, not standing in prayer at the call of a lark, not climbing a mountain to see the sunrise, not staying awake all night to gaze at the Ursa Major. She did not differentiate between earth and gravel, but she distinguished the earth from the sky. She had not seen the skies of the earth, but she knew there were earths of the sky. She saw herself in an inevitable process of stagnation. She was already partially rotten within.
“What can I do with this mass of trivial knowledge?” she wondered aloud. “How can I cut through it?”
Farrokhlaqa was awake and standing at the entrance to the house in her woolen housecoat.
“The house is freezing cold,” she said, sounding upset. “Obviously, you left the door open.”
“I’m sorry,” said Munis, already aware that Farrokhlaqa wanted the women out of the house.
“In your opinion,” Munis asked, “what can I do with all this trivial knowledge?”
“What trivial knowledge?” Farrokhlaqa asked, puzzled.
“I mean all this trivial knowledge, for example, you wanting us out of the house. Why should I know this?”
Farrokhlaqa shrugged her shoulders dismissively. By now she had learned how to deal with Munis and was no longer intimidated by her mind-reading ability. She had decided that Munis was too simple-minded to be able to exploit the knowledge she gained from mind reading for some practical purpose. She was only tormented by it.
“I’m going to Tehran today,” she announced. “I have rented a house there. You people can stay here for as long as you want. I’m going to be back in the summer. Give the key to the gardener when you leave.”
Mahdokht
(Reprise)
MAHDOKHT HAD PLANTED HERSELF on the riverbank in the fall. She suffered as the clay around her ankles hardened. The freezing rainstorms of the season tore her clothes to shreds. She was left dressed in tatters. She shivered incessantly until the winter frost froze her all over. But her eyes were left open, looking at the river as it flowed by.
With the first spring showers, a thaw set in and splintered the ice and she felt the tingling of sprouting buds on her limbs. Her toes resumed their growth as roots, and they penetrated deeper and deeper into the earth. She could hear them grow. They extracted nutrients from the earth and spread them through her organs. She listened to the sound of the roots and watched the water in the river turn green.
The fall arrived again, and with it came the cold. But she no longer suffered. The roots stopped their growth and so did every part of her body.
That winter she was fed with dewdrops. Although she felt the frost covering her, she still saw the river as green, with a slight tinge of blue.
In the spring she was once more covered with sprouting buds. She welcomed the spring and her heart filled with joy, a joy that she passed on to the buds as they grew into green leaves.
When the summer arrived, she saw the water turn blue and schools of fish in it.
Freezing weather returned in early autumn and the sky darkened. But her heart was still joyful, having now found unison with the spirit of the tree, storing all the goodness of the earth.
By midwinter she was being fed with human breast milk. This gave her an explosive burst of energy thawing the ice even before the advent of spring. But it also made her ache all over as she had to confine the force within her body. Now, as she stared at the river, she no longer saw a continual stream, but a flux of liquid drops rushing in the riverbed helter-skelter in their numberless multitude. This exacerbated her pain. Her senses infiltrated the droplets of the river current and made her palpitate in unison with the heartbeat of each drop.
Women Without Men Page 8