The Blood of Flowers

by Anita Amirrezvani

  When we were clean, we dressed in fresh black clothes and black head scarves and went in search of Gostaham at the Image of the World, which Shah Abbas had built after naming Isfahan his new capital. We entered the square through a narrow gateway that gave no hint of its vastness, but once inside we halted in our tracks, astonished.

  “Our whole village . . .!” I began to say. My mother finished the sentence, for she was thinking the same thing.

  “. . .could fit in this square two times over. No wonder people say Isfahan is half the world!”

  The square was so large that the people at either end looked like figures in a miniature painting. The minarets of the Friday mosque were so long, thin, and tall that when I looked up at them, I felt dizzy, for they seemed to vanish into the sky. The mosque’s huge turquoise dome appeared to be suspended in space; surely the hand of man must have been aided by God to make clay seem so light! The tall gateway to the bazaar was surmounted by a mural—the first I had ever seen—of a battle, which looked as real as if the men were fighting before our eyes. Everything about the square seemed to defy the ordinary laws of possibility.

  “Khanoom, please move forward,” cried a man behind us, using the respectful term for a married woman. We apologized and stepped away from the entrance. Looking back as he passed, he added with a smile, “First time? I still enjoy seeing the wonder on visitors’ faces.”

  Wonder was right. On the shorter sides of the square, Shah Abbas’s blue-and-gold palace faced his private yellow-domed mosque, which glowed like a tiny sun. On the longer sides, the gateway to the Great Bazaar faced the entrance to the vast Friday mosque—a reminder to God-fearing merchants to be honest.

  “Power, money, and God, all in one place,” remarked my mother, looking at the buildings around us.

  “And chogan,” I replied, noticing the goalposts for polo at the far ends of the square, which was long enough to host a competition.

  From the top of one of the Friday mosque’s minarets, the muezzin began the call to prayer, piercing the air with his sweet nasal voice. “Allah-hu-Akbar—God is great!” he cried, his voice drifting above us.

  As we walked into the square, I noticed that most of the buildings were tiled in the purest colors of sun and sky. The dome of the Friday mosque looked all turquoise from afar, but up closer I could see it was enlivened with swirling vines in yellow and white. Garlands of white and turquoise blossomed on the dome of the Shah’s lemon-colored mosque. The arched gateways to the mosques sprouted a profusion of tiled white flowers that looked like stars sparkling in the blue of twilight. Every surface of every building glittered with ornament. It was as if a master goldsmith had selected the most flawless turquoise, the rarest of blue sapphires, the brightest yellow topaz, and the purest of diamonds, and arranged them into an infinity of shimmering patterns that radiated color and light.

  “I have never seen anything so wonderful,” I said to my mother, forgetting for a moment the sadness that had brought us here.

  My mother hadn’t forgotten. “It’s all too big,” she replied, gesturing at the wide square, and I understood that she missed our tiny village, where she knew everyone she saw.

  The square was full of people. Young boys zoomed around us, balancing cups of hot, dark liquid, yelling, “Coffee!” “Coffee!” which I had never tasted but which smelled as rich as a meal. Two jugglers performed a swift exchange of balls, begging the audience to be generous with their coins. Hawkers stopped us a dozen times, asking us to examine cloth, kohl, and even the tusk of an elephant, an enormous animal from India with legendary powers of memory.

  After a few minutes of walking, we reached the Shah’s palace. Compared with the Friday mosque, it seemed modest. It was only a few stories high, and it was protected by a pair of thick, carved wooden doors, eight brass cannon, and a row of guards armed with swords. My mother approached one of the guards and asked how we could find Gostaham the carpet maker.

  “What is your business with him?” asked the guard with a frown.

  “He told us to seek him out,” said my mother. The guard smiled scornfully at the sound of her long village vowels.

  “He invited you?”

  “He is part of my husband’s family.”

  The guard looked as if he doubted her word. “Gostaham is a master in the Shah’s carpet-making workshop, which is behind the palace,” he said. “I will tell him you are here.”

  “We are the dust beneath your feet,” said my mother, and we went back into the square to wait. Nearby, there was a bazaar of metal beaters, and we watched the smiths pound the shapes of birds and animals into teapots, cups, and spoons.

  Before long, the guard found us and led us to meet Gostaham, who was waiting near the palace door. I was surprised by how little he and my father resembled each other. It was true that they were only half brothers, but while my father had been tall with features cut as cleanly as if with a knife, Gostaham was short and as round as a potato, with drooping eyes, a nose curved like a falcon’s beak, and a large gray beard. He greeted us kindly and welcomed us to Isfahan. Beaming at me, he grabbed my two hands between his. “Well, then!” he exclaimed. “So you’re Isma’il’s child. You’ve got his walnut color and his straight black hair, and I would know those tiny, perfect hands anywhere!”

  He made a show of examining my hands, which made me laugh, and compared them with his own. They were very small for a man and, like mine, narrow with long fingers.

  “The family resemblance is obvious,” he said. “Do you make rugs?”

  “Of course,” said my mother. “She’s the best knotter in our village.” And she told him the story of how we had sold my turquoise rug while it was still on my loom.

  “May the hand of Ali always be with you!” said Gostaham, looking impressed.

  He asked my mother for news of home. As we followed him out of the square, she began telling him about my father. The words poured out of her as if they had been bottled up for too long, and she told the story of his death with so much feeling, it brought tears to his eyes.

  We left the Image of the World through a narrow gateway and walked for a few minutes through a district called Four Gardens to get to Gostaham’s home. The district was divided into pleasure parks, which were barren now that it was winter. A cedar tree marked the beginning of Gostaham’s street. From the outside, all the houses looked like fortresses. They were situated behind tall, thick walls that protected the inhabitants from prying eyes.

  Gostaham led us through thick wooden gates, and we stood for a moment looking at the outside of his home. It was so large we didn’t know where to go at first. Gostaham entered a narrow corridor, walked up a few steps, and led us into the birooni, or outside rooms, where he entertained male guests. His Great Room had long glass windows depicting two green swans drinking blue water from either side of a fountain. Carved white plaster flowers and vines adorned the ceiling and the walls. Ruby-colored carpets, made with the tightest knots I had ever seen, supported thick cushions in warm crimson tones. Even on this cold winter day, the room seemed to radiate warmth.

  Gostaham lifted the windows, which opened all the way to the ground, and we stepped out into the large courtyard. It had a pool of water shaded by two poplars. I thought of the single tree in my village, a large cypress. For one family to have its own shade and greenery seemed to me the greatest of luxuries.

  We met Gordiyeh, Gostaham’s wife, in the courtyard. She was an ample woman, with large round hips and heavy breasts, who advanced slowly to kiss us on both cheeks. One of her servants had just boiled water, and I watched him make tea out of previously used leaves. It was strange that a household this grand would use its leaves twice. The tea was as tasteless as water, but we thanked Gordiyeh and said, “May your hands never ache.”

  “How old are you?” she asked me.

  “Fifteen.”

  “Ah! Then you’ll have to meet Naheed. She’s fifteen, too, and is the daughter of a woman who lives nearby.”

&n
bsp; She turned to my mother. “Naheed comes from a very good family. I have always hoped that they might commission a carpet from us, but they haven’t yet.”

  I wondered why she hoped to sell more carpets, since to my eyes she already had everything a family could want. But before I could ask any questions, Gordiyeh suggested that we must be tired, and led us through the courtyard to a tiny room squeezed between the kitchen storerooms and the latrine. There was nothing in it but two bedrolls, blankets, and cushions.

  “My apologies that the room is so unworthy of your presence,” Gordiyeh said, “but all the others are occupied.”

  My mother struggled to keep the dismay from her face. The walls were dingy, and the floor was streaked with dust. Gostaham’s house was a palace compared to our little village home, but the tiny room we were to share was more humble.

  “Not at all,” replied my mother politely, “your generosity far exceeds what we deserve.”

  Gordiyeh left us for the afternoon rest. I straightened my bedroll, raising dust, which brought on a fit of coughing. After a few moments, I heard one of the house servants enter a room next to ours, while another opened the door to the latrines, releasing a thick, earthy smell even more pungent than the odor of our camel.

  “Are we servants now?” I asked my mother in alarm. She was stretched out on a bedroll, her eyes wide open.

  “Not yet,” she replied, but I could see that she was worried about that very question.

  AFTER SLEEPING, we arose and joined Gordiyeh and Gostaham in the birooni for the evening meal. What a feast was laid on cloths before us! I had not seen such food even at weddings, yet for Gordiyeh and Gostaham it seemed to be everyday fare. There was a chilled yogurt soup with dill, mint, green raisins, walnuts, and rose petals, cold and refreshing on the tongue; stewed chicken with tart sweetened barberries; tender eggplant cooked with garlic and whey; saffron rice with a crunchy brown crust; tangy sheep’s cheese; hot bread; and a plate of radishes, fresh mint, and bitter greens for good digestion. I ate too much the first evening, as if to make up for the times in my village when we hadn’t had enough.

  When we were all sated, my mother began to speak. “Exalted hosts,” she said, “we are honored that you have taken us into your household and fed us as if it were only yesterday that we last parted. And yet, I haven’t seen you, honorable Gostaham, for more than twenty-five years. In that time, you have risen faster than the highest star. How did you come to be here, in this grand house, with all the good fortune that a man could desire?”

  Gostaham smiled and put his hands on his large stomach. “Indeed, sometimes when I arise in the morning and look around, I can’t believe it myself. And then when I see Gordiyeh beside me, I know my dreams have become real, and I thank God for my many blessings.”

  “May they be forever plentiful,” replied my mother.

  “It wasn’t always like this, though. Long before you were born,” Gostaham said to me, “my father realized that if he was to remain in his village, he would always be poor. Knowing there would be little to inherit, he moved to Shiraz to test his fortune. We were so poor that I had to help by making rugs. When I was twelve, I discovered that I could knot faster than almost anyone.”

  “Just like my daughter,” my mother said proudly.

  “Our home was so small that there was no space for a loom. When the weather was fine, I set up my loom outside, just as you must have done,” Gostaham said to me. “One day I was knotting a rug with such speed that a small crowd gathered to watch. It was my good fortune that one of the passersby owned the largest rug workshop in Shiraz. He never looked for apprentices outside the workshop—why should he, when he could just train his workers’ sons? But when he saw me, he offered to hire me, for my speed would increase his profits.

  “The next few years were the harshest of my life. The workshop owner made his demands according to ability, not age. Because I was fast, I was required to finish rugs more quickly than anyone else. Once, when the owner caught me away from the loom, he told one of his bullies to throw me onto my back and beat the soles of my feet until I screamed. No one but a fool would destroy a knotter’s hands, but what did he care if I couldn’t walk?”

  His story made me shiver. I had heard of children younger than me, mostly orphans, who had been forced to spend long hours at the loom. Sometimes, at the end of their day, they couldn’t unbend their legs to stand up, and their caretakers had to bear them home on their backs. After they spent years laboring with folded legs, their bones grew twisted and their heads seemed too large for their bodies. When they tried to walk, they tottered like old people. I was glad I had grown up in a village where no one would allow a loom to break a child’s body. Even so, when I was working at my loom on a warm spring day, I used to envy the birds and even the scrawny dogs, who were free to roam as they liked. To be young and have to sit quietly and work, when your blood is racing and you long to be chattering and laughing—that will make a child grow old quickly.

  “The truth is, the owner of the workshop was right,” Gostaham continued. “I tried to shirk my duties because I didn’t want to remain a knotter. Whenever I could, I spent time with his master designer and master colorist. The designer allowed me to copy some of his patterns, and the colorist took me with him to the bazaar to show me how he selected shades of wool. Secretly, I learned all I could.”

  It had never occurred to me that it was possible to be more than just a knotter. Although I was sleepy from the large meal, I listened to Gostaham’s tale with care.

  “My husband didn’t need much teaching,” Gordiyeh burst in. “His eye for color is better than any man’s.”

  Gostaham leaned back into the cushions with a smile, enjoying his wife’s praise. “I was so ambitious that I told the master designer I wanted to make a carpet of my own. He offered me a design on paper that he wasn’t using anymore and allowed me to copy it. Taking all my earnings, I went to the bazaar and bought the best wool I could afford. I spent hours choosing the colors, taking so long at it that the merchants yelled at me to buy something or leave their shops. But I had to be certain beyond certainty that I was choosing the right hues.

  “By then I was seventeen, and it took me nearly a year to knot that carpet outside of working hours. It was the best I had ever made. My mother was pleased with me, for it would bring money into our household. But then I took the biggest risk of my life, which is the reason you see me here today in this fine home, with a wife who outshines the brightest stars of the age.”

  I sat up straighter, eager to learn how he had made such a fortune.

  “I heard that Shah Abbas the Great was coming to Shiraz and would be holding audiences for his subjects every afternoon. I finished the rug, rolled it up, and carried it to his palace on my back. Presenting it to one of his guards, I explained that it was a gift. The guard unrolled it, making sure there were no assassins, animals, poisons, or the like hidden within—and promised to place it before his eyes.”

  “How bold to part with your only treasure!” exclaimed my mother.

  “The rug was presented to the Shah after he heard testimony from a servant accused of stealing and ordered him to be punished with a beating,” Gostaham continued. “I think he was ready to enjoy some sweeter news. When my carpet was unrolled before him, he flipped over a corner to check the tightness of the knots. I worried that he was simply going to tell his servants to carry it away, but then he asked that its maker make himself known.

  “Looking at me with eyes that seemed to understand my poverty and my ambition, the Shah said, ‘Every day, kings offer me gifts of gold, but not one compares with the sacrifice you have just made.’ It was my great fortune that he had just started the royal rug workshop in Isfahan to make the finest rugs for his palaces and to sell to rich men. He liked my carpet enough to invite me to join the workshop for a year’s trial. My mother almost beat me when she heard I had given away the carpet. When I told her how my fortunes had changed, she praised the Shah’s nam
e.”

  “That is a story beyond stories!” said my mother.

  “There was a long road yet ahead,” said Gostaham. “When I started at the royal rug workshop, I was the lowliest of the low. I was lucky because all of us were paid an annual salary, and even though mine was the smallest, it was enough for me to live on and send money to my family. Conditions were much better at the Shah’s workshop than in Shiraz. We worked from dawn until midday, but then we were at liberty to work for ourselves. In the afternoons, I freely learned from the masters with the approval of the Shah.”

  “So you have come to know him?” I asked with wonder, for the Shah was second only to God.

  “Just as his humble servant,” said Gostaham. “He takes great interest in carpets and knows how to knot them himself. From time to time he stops by the workshop, which is, after all, adjacent to his palace, to see how the carpets are progressing, and sometimes we exchange a few words. But to return to my story, one of his chief colorists took an interest in me and trained me to master the way hues are combined in a carpet. That has been my job for nearly twenty years, and after my dear mentor went to meet God, I became one of the assistant masters for color.”

  “They are second only to the master,” said Gordiyeh proudly. “And perhaps he will one day become master of the whole workshop.”

  “There is no certainty in that,” Gostaham said. “I have a strong competitor in Afsheen, the assistant master designer, and I believe the Shah is more impressed by designers than colorists. Still, I wouldn’t change anything about the course of my life. Because it was that very colorist—the one who made me his apprentice—who taught me everything I know, and who also gave me his daughter as his wife.” And here he smiled at Gordiyeh with so much affection and desire that it reminded me of the way my father used to look at my mother. My mother noticed, too, and for a moment her eyes filled.

  “What kind of rugs do you make in the royal workshop?” I asked quickly, hoping Gostaham would stop smiling at his wife.