“We got that part already!” I said. And then I think I understood why Madam Lilla was racing to the mother goddess, fearful that she might arrive too late and miss her, racing to see a mother goddess who had been waiting there for thousands of years.
We stood in front of a hole in the rock that was so small even someone as slight as Madam Lilla had to bend over to get through. She snapped her umbrella shut. Looking up at the sky, she said, “Thank God for giving us these days,” and with that she leaned over and shuffled into the cave. She was gone, fast enough to slip away into another world. We scrambled in after her. We stopped and waited for our eyes to adjust to the gloom, until we could make out each other’s faces. Then Madam Lilla said, “This way,” flashing her light down the middle passage of three. Then running the light over our feet, she said, “Come on, there’s nothing to be afraid of.” The deeper we went into the cave the cooler and more humid the air. Surfaces became softer and smoother. Amira was still sleepy and teetering along, moaning and griping as she stumbled over her feet. Maryam was letting out little grunts of discontent. I am breathing – my breath was so loud. Madam Lilla’s long skirt is rustling. We are rolling forward like a ball of sound. Now and then I can see black drawings on the walls, signs. Madam Lilla begins whispering something, like a prayer. I think it might be Arabic but I can’t be sure. Touching Maryam, I flash her a quizzical look. She doesn’t know.
As Madam Lilla finishes whispering we arrive at an opening in the wall just big enough for a small group of people to pass through. “Here,” said Lilla, “Tanit!” We marvelled at the signs on the walls: triangles, a circle placed on the top corner of one, and between the circle and the triangle a horizontal shape pointing upwards at both ends. So this was the sign of Tanit. It looked like a young girl in a dress. There were signs on every part of this opening in the cave all with various depictions of Tanit. It was as if everyone – maybe only women – had dropped everything they were doing one day and came into this cave to do all this in a single burst of activity. Maybe a thousand years ago women who were thinking about the same things we think about but in an entirely different language sat down here and made a god, like they were kneading dough. Rubbing, murmuring prayers and breathing over them. A sweet humidity filled the cave, a refreshing coolness, a deep relaxing warmth, a prenatal sleep in the waters of the womb. The women had woven for themselves a womb of stone. It felt like we were entirely safe here, apart from the rest of the world. The women before us were the sum of their breath, full of good wishes.
Madam Lilla finished a prayer with her eyes shut. She was either giving thanks to a higher power or making some kind of solemn promise. This wasn’t our place, this temple didn’t belong to us and like awkward tourists we were silent with our hands respectfully crossed over our stomachs. Madam Lilla opened her eyes, looked again at the image of Tanit, then turned to us and said in a surprisingly polite tone of voice, “Please have a seat.”
She stepped over to the image of Tanit and stood there. She placed the flashlight between us. The heavenly beam of the light must have made Maryam nervous. “Madam Lilla for the love of God where are we going with all this?”
“I am taking you to the real you, ladies,” said Madam Lilla and Maryam hissed at her like she was hawking a ball of phlegm. “Oh, great God!”
Madam Lilla was unfazed and raising her hand she closed each finger one by one, leaving her forefinger extended, as if to say, “Just a minute.” And she began her speech.
“You … people like us … we don’t agree to a trip like this out of the blue… We don’t take a trip like this to please anyone. You didn’t come here for my sake. And not because Amira might have killed someone. You each know why you’re here. People like us cannot thrive in the savagery of a home. Certainly there is no need for blood: but in a story that unfolds in just one place someone is bound to be killed. And being on the road brings people together. Defeat, setback and ruin – it’s all there – but there’s no animosity. That is why we set out on these journeys. But now I know you well enough, you see your own choices as a stroke of ill fate. And now you walk along this road as victims and not as heroes because you cannot come to grips with the fact that you have chosen this path. Ladies, you must learn to drink your own tears and change pain into anger.”
Maryam shuddered. She shuddered and I felt a cold sweat oozing out of my pores. I didn’t know why. But something happened to Maryam when Madam Lilla said we had to learn to drink our own tears. Only later would we understand why. Madam Lilla went on.
“To stop is to settle, to build a castle.You reject the idea of living like all the others but you aren’t willing to show the courage in your hearts. Just who are you then? You aren’t the kind of women to build a castle, that much I know for sure.”
This time Amira started and quivered and she let out a deep sigh. Maryam and I could hear the moist echo of her breath. She was moved by something.
Madam Lilla continued, “You have clearly fallen into this world. Like all your counterparts throughout the course of history, you are one of a kind and alone. You take life seriously but you do not know how.”
I looked at Maryam. This was precisely what she was telling me earlier when she was kneading the dough.
“You must learn this from the Goddess Tanit and all the other wise women and from my humble self. Not because I feel compassion for you, and certainly not pity. It is only that it would be a sin for me to watch others like myself go to ruin, a sin in the eyes of Tanit. That’s why I seized you. I took you in my hands, ladies. The first night I saw you, I saw who you really are. But how is it that you are now three women in solidarity and so miserable at the same time? Yes, we must change with the help of Tanit. We have to heal you. We must mend. You need to trust me. You are souls that only have a home in each other, you are souls bound to the road. When we come back nothing will be the same. Now that you have crossed the border consider yourselves dead and ready to live. Now you can lose yourselves without any doubts.”
Now I was the one who shuddered and Amira turned to look at me. She must have remembered what I had said to her in the school building where the women were mixing sugar: “Now that I have died I can live.” As if she knew Madam Lilla was speaking about getting lost. And considering that both Amira and Maryam had just shuddered in the same way, Madam Lilla must have said something that hit them in the heart too.
Blind to our startled reactions, Madam Lilla went on, “Now I am going to take you away from here. We will head south where we’ll cross the border into Egypt and make our way to Alexandria. And if all goes according to plan we’ll get on a boat and sail to Lebanon. There we will decide what to do next. But I promise you this: it will all be magnificent. You’ll find new strength along the way. I have faith in you. And you must have faith in life. Now … is there anything you need to ask?”
What could we ask her? She asked when we had nothing to say. She asked when we were not really there. As if up against a powerful mother, we were speechless and we had clearly surrendered – though we all had different reasons.
“So then make an oath to Tanit. Right here and now. Say, ‘we have died and when we step outside we will be born again.’ Ladies, have faith in this and you will have victory.”
“Let’s go,” said Madam Lilla. “Take my hand, I don’t want you to get lost.” We took each other by the hand and as we made our way out of the cave along a surprisingly shorter route than the one we had come in by, Amira stuttered like a child, “So then … you’ll teach us … what we don’t know… What was it?”
That’s when Madam Lilla turned back to the cave and spoke. “Ladies! You will learn how to kill! You will learn how to kill the one that has killed you!”
This wise woman who so wanted to protect us from the world was one of us and her compassionate smack in the face felt good.
She stepped outside. She opened her umbrella. The expression on her face was the one she wore on the night we first met. A little later, as if n
othing of any consequence had happened in the cave, she lightheartedly said, “Now you go and get some rest.” Smiling, she marched ahead. We were still standing in the cave. Taking my arm, Maryam flashed her torch on one of the walls.
“Have you seen this?”
Specks of metal glimmered in the two tunnels on either side of the one we had gone through. Adjusting her eyes to the gloom, Maryam slowly stepped into the one on the right. Then we saw the chests filled with guns. Another packed with grenades. English writing on them. Others were marked with Qatar flags. Maryam said:
“So I suppose Madam Lilla doesn’t see all this? She calls it a temple but it’s actually a weapons depot.”
“Yes,” I said, “she definitely lives in another world.”
Maryam was now really angry:
“We’ve lost our marbles, azizi. The woman is like Don Quixote, lost in a dream.”
Amira was the only one who wasn’t prepared to betray her reason for shuddering a little while ago.
“But she’s our Don Quixote!”
And she walked out of the cave. Like a rosary with only three beads left, we walked home single file. No one said a word. I asked just one question to them both: “Why did you shudder like that when she gave that speech?”
Neither of them answered. The question fell to the earth like a piece of raw meat, rotted there. We went inside the house and we fell asleep.
When we woke up a few hours later the sun was setting. The desert was the colour of cotton candy. Without saying a word we got dressed and went outside for some fresh air. Maryam mumbled to Amira, “bring your letters with you”. She said nothing more as we left the house. It was like nothing had happened that morning, the funeral and everything with Madam Lilla. I suppose it was only after walking for some time that we slowly came to understand that what had happened was more than a troubled afternoon dream. We walked up the hill overlooking the village where we could watch the full setting sun in all its glory. Maryam sat down on the sand and we sat down beside her. She lit a cigarette and we followed her lead. Pulling a notebook from her back pocket, she said, “This woman … this woman will either lead us to disaster or, like she said, we’ll take the trip of our lives… You asked me why I shuddered. Well here’s why…”
And with that she began to read as Dido:
Dido’s Second Tablet
Stranger, tonight I had them light all the candles. So that from a distance the palace windows might look like flames. The painful truth is that the sea of your dreams is not vast enough to imagine my existence as queen. What a pity that I am now ready for you. Ah, it is all so clear! Your ignorance will be my negligence.
Stranger, the wine is now coursing through my veins. Heavy red dreams are pressing down on my bosom. In order to tell you my tale, I am tearing it to pieces, wringing it in the palms of my hands, weaving it with silver words.
It was years and years ago, stranger, when the Gods told me that I would be killed, for the most dreadful assassin from the kingdom of Phoenicia was after me. I was young and in my eyes he was horrific. Horrific because we were brother and sister. And horrific because they ordered the murder of my husband king. They took the beloved spirit of my palace with a blunt knife. When such a catastrophe looms it brings a mysterious calm to its victims. I was sleeping as if unaware of what was to come. But the gods woke me with portentous nightmares. Victims believe their innocence might bring them mercy at the hand of an oppressive fate. Before the night was through I hastily filled the hide of a bull with all my gold and all my worldly knowledge. I was only able bring with me but a handful of mementos. And unfurling our sails we struck out upon the Mediterranean, leaving behind the cardamom-scented pleasures of that place, its cerulean glass and light pink silk pillows, leaving all to fade into a purple cloud. Those who weren’t agile enough to save themselves from the cruellest fate had no choice but to stay behind.
With a handful of faithful soldiers we set sail on the Mediterranean Sea. And Penelope… My dear young Penelope. She was born to love me and would die for me. Of course she was there by my side. To this day she still does not know. Her fear is the source of my courage. She cowers and for that I have the heart of a lion. Her fear is the antidote to my fear.
I boarded our ship and the winds swirled around us. Winds are the hands made by the gods for people like me. Unmerciful hands. The gods say what they will say to us with flaming whips. If our hearts overflow it is a proof of their wild passions. Ah! Gods love the mortals who write their own stories the way they love their own peers.
You know so much, traveller! You will board your ship because there is nowhere else for you to go.
I was but a fresh flower, a stranger, all alone, and when I landed on these shores, the savage Berbers were wrapped in crude cloth. On their faces they wore those fearful desert marks. They knew not how to love glass or sand or children. They lived hidden from each other, from the gods, from the wind and the sea…. They hardly spoke. They were crude. When I reached those shores I saw that the gods had left me no place of refuge in this new land.
Rain was pouring down from the skies when I arrived. Through autumn I washed my memories of Phoenicia with my tears. But I gathered those tears in an inkwell. And one night, stranger, in the darkest hour, I woke up with a dream. I knew if I could not dispel it with my breath – if I did not breathe strongly – that this malady called sadness would remain and I would never uncoil that dark giant knot in my chest. The gods told me so much. The gods said, drink your gathered tears. They told me to make anger of my fear. Your anger should become revenge, they said, your revenge should become human life. Drink your tears and let copper water flow over your flesh that seeks mercy. The sky broke open in a thunderous clap and at last the rain came pouring down. I drank my tears and slipped into a dreamless sleep. The morning was gilded like Phoenician glass. I woke with nothing in my breast. Taking Penelope with me, we climbed to the highest hilltop. I breathed in, and, breathing out my eyes were opened and saw what the savages had not seen. I saw the place where the sea hugged the land and I foresaw my victory. The sea is just like me in the way she embraces the shore. If only I could take that shore and make of her a shelter for ships like mine.
The savages laughed at me. They mocked me for taking the land where buffaloes wallowed in the mud. They called me Madam Buffalo. Only to mock me they asked for more gold and then for even more. I fell from grace in the eyes of my warriors. The savages made up distasteful stories about me, and they sang disgraceful songs in the town square. I am Dido, stranger! I founded my city like any other exile unfurling the sails of courage because she is done with fear. With the patience that comes with the desire for revenge I bore the ridicule of the underworld gods and the savages that roamed the earth. And I named this land. I named it Byrsa. A place of refuge. The gods told me: that the exiles pursuing me would come here. Every man and woman crossing the Mediterranean in fear, every ruler fallen from grace, every brave warrior suffering injustice, every princess whose heart has withered after shedding too many tears, they will all find their way to Carthage.
Hey lion heart who came to me without knowing that he had unfurled his sails for me! I have founded this country for people like me. I know that you have also fled. That you are looking for something. For the waves will only bring people like us to these shores.
Hey stranger, I now taste on my tongue the tears that I have drunk. Wine is calling me back to an innocence. My mind is foggy, I am angry for showing weakness, I am afraid at night. Are you curious to know my story? The marble pillars of my city are not strong enough to bear my city at night. Will you hear that which I will not say? In the dark my eyes cannot make out the glorious silk. Ah! Graceful man! Will you be able to deceive Dido who is weary of her powers?
“People grow weary of their powers,” I said as Maryam’s voice trailed off into the sky. “In any event,” said Maryam, “that’s how an invitation to a major tragedy comes about; but it seems only women do it like that…”
Pinching her thumb and her index finger, Amira flicked her cigarette butt into the distance. She rubbed her face a couple of times and she looked down at the letter crumpled up in her lap. And she started to read…
Muhammed’s Second Letter
Greetings, sweetie,
Hey! You’re looking as wonderful as always! But I should remind you again to take care of yourself. If anything ever happened to you the beauty God assembled on this earth would be knocked out of balance.
Fine then, seeing that you have come back home I’ll just tell you a few things the angels told me to tell you and then I’ll finish without going on for too long. I shouldn’t take up too much of your time when your fans, who must have gone wild when they heard you were coming back to town, are chasing after you.
So you see, sweetie, for some of us, the rules of Islam are but a string of prohibitions to reel in our slipshod ways and idleness, but for unique beings like yourself, it is an institution that harnesses the desires in your heart and encourages you to do good. For example, if you as our princess don’t have any idea about the proper distribution of religious alms, you might just go ahead and recklessly hand out everything you have, forgetting yourself altogether. You might lose your mind turning every which way to make all the children and the cats happy with what you have to offer.For people like you, who only come around every hundred years, God puts a limit on your goodness and beauty. If we let go you would never stop praying, don’t you think, sweetheart?
Hey! Your new haircut really looks good. Looks like you just came back from handing out sweets to kids in heaven. It’s only natural you look a little worn out.
Fine then, have a look around. Look at the market stretching into the Old City. Most of the people you see there know how to look after themselves. Though there isn’t even one notable statue inside and not one unrivalled mosaic, those people are experts in building castle walls. Now you’ve been so busy with matters of excellence since the day you were born that you haven’t had the time to look into such things. If you could only look up and look around instead of handing out your beauty to the world, you might have the time to consider a defence strategy – you could call a meeting of defence engineers. But you have other things to do and we are all aware of their importance. So you need to set aside this role of victim you often slip into when you say, ‘People won’t leave me alone, the whole world is out to get me.’ It doesn’t suit you and you should trust in your angels. If I could just manage to adjust these things and if my prayers made it to the right address then everything from here on will work out in your favour. In the end you should only think about being you. That is to say there is no need to mix cement when you’re making a sculpture out of ice.
Women Who Blow on Knots Page 17