He also said to himself: And at last, even in this fall, as long as it’s happening, you won’t be a subject for your self-pity. These old tears are not the business of others. You can bear it, too.
He went down from this room and its stifling walls. The pangs of pain had exhausted him. He sensed their essence. It was past midnight and the night had entered into profound stillness. The air hung heavy, enclosed. Before him stretched long days and nights, he wasn’t finished yet with anything. In the vast openness next to the sea, on the port’s sidewalk, the night in mid-May felt hotter than usual and the water’s surface appeared motionless as far as he could see. A strong leaden surface, it was greenish, its waters melting silently on the sword of slight sand, under the boats—boats with protruding bones and proud chests. Their spread nets were drying, dangling without a flutter. In the morning the fishermen would mend them and at evening they would go out early seeking their meager fortune.
Mikhail heard unhurried but determined footsteps behind him. When he looked around, he saw someone approaching. The man reached Mikhail, slowed down, and greeted him: Good evening, Effendina.
It was an Alexandrian from the inner city. He wore a shirt and trousers. On his head was a small lasa skullcap of white perforated knit. A thin man, his eyes were wakeful at night. It was clear that the sun had tanned his clean-shaven face—still fresh, youthful, taut, not in the least flabby.
Mikhail answered back: Good evening.
He looked at Mikhail without reserve or sense of awkwardness. His footsteps fell alongside Mikhail’s. With utter familiarity, he said: Service to you, Effendina?
Mikhail said: Not at all. Thanks. I’m just strolling.
The young man said: Stranger here?
He said: A stranger? Yes, a stranger. But I am originally from here. I was born and lived here.
The young man said kindly and generously: Ahlan wa-sahlan. You honor us!
Then the young man hurried a little and said: So long. He went his way toward the low, stony houses, one next to each other, behind the royal palace piercing the sea, the mysterious towers and domes, the lamps illuminating only limited round spots in the moonlight. In front of them were a large green garden and Indian palm trees with outspread palm leaves, quiet in the heat, as still as a painting. In front of their houses, men slept on mats. They were gathered together in their sleep, supporting their heads on folded arms. In their surrender to the night sky, there was a kind of haughtiness, which they were not aware of.
She had said to him: Isn’t all this somewhat old-fashioned, no more in use?
He had said to himself in a loud voice: Isn’t all this very primitive and very naive?
She said to him: Primitive maybe, but it is not obtuse and it is not—what is the word?—raw, it is not obscene.
He said to her: It is fierce and has no place here now.
She said: And that is why I love you.
He said: And that is why I love you and hate this primitive thing.
She said: That’s not true. Or not quite, at least. You may also hate it, but surely you love it too.
He had said: Perhaps.
The ground of the sidewalk under his feet was white, washed with fine cracks. The road in front of him lay empty, though hardly desolate. The unflecked sky hung oppressively near, but he shouldered its difficult burden in a familiar way, as if the sky itself had become part of him. The moon had plunged into the sea bequeathing a pale yellowish redness. The stars were dense, crowded. The stings of their lights clustered in a sea of blueness: dark, luxurious, silky black. The night-hunting kites were flying in large arcs, coming down straight with calm wings then rising up effortlessly, coming toward the sea from the side of the graveyard.
And Mikhail knew there was a subterranean love still in his heart, no one to blame for its presence. Despite all the lies, all the deformations, the flow of life’s sap in this love had taught him that there is, just the same, a candor and fidelity that go beyond the sum of things. Her love, her desire was no lie.
As for me, I am surrendering myself to the last of what I have-as far as I know, to the last of what exists. I’ll confront this ache until the last day with no armor, with no camouflage, and with no vindication.
Modern Arabic Writing
from the American University in Cairo Press
Ibrahim Abdel Meguid The Other Place • No One Sleeps
in Alexandria
Yahya Taher Abdullah The Mountain of Green Tea
Leila Abouzeid The Last Chapter
Salwa Bakr The Wiles of Men
Hoda Barakat The Tiller of Waters
Mourid Barghouti I Saw Ramallah
Mohamed El-Bisatie Houses Behind the Trees
A Last Glass of Tea
Fathy Ghanem The Man Who Lost His Shadow
Tawfiq al-Hakim The Prison of Life
Taha Hussein A Man of Letters • The Sufferers • The Days
Sonallah Ibrahim Cairo: From Edge to Edge • Zaat
The Committee
Yusuf Idris City of Love and Ashes
Denys Johnson-Davies Under the Naked Sky: Short Stories
from the Arab World
Said al-Kafrawi The Hill of Gypsies
Edwar al-Kharrat Rama and the Dragon
Naguib Mahfouz Adrift on the Nile
Akhenaten, Dweller in Truth • Arabian Nights and Days
Autumn Quail • The Beggar
The Beginning and the End • The Cairo Trilogy:
Palace Walk • Palace of Desire • Sugar Street
Children of the Alley • The Day the Leader Was Killed
Echoes of an Autobiography • The Harafish
The Journey of Ibn Fattouma • Midaq Alley • Miramar
Naguib Mahfouz at Sidi Gaber • Respected Sir • The Search
The Thief and the Dogs • The Time and the Place
Wedding Song • Voices from the Other World
Ahlam Mosteghanemi Memory in the Flesh
Buthaina Al Nasiri Final Night
‘Abd al-Hakim Qasim Rites of Assent
Somaya Ramadan Leaves of Narcissus
Lenin El-Ramly In Plain Arabic
Rafik Schami Damascus Nights
Miral al-Tahawy The Tent • Blue Aubergine
Bahaa Taher Love in Exile
Fuad al-Takarli The Long Way Back
Latifa al-Zayyat The Open Door
Rama and the Dragon Page 33
