“You call that babbling?” He chuckled. “You don’t talk much.”
I sat down on the sidewalk next to the old man. It was noon now, and the saffron sun stood equidistant from its goals. The world was echoing in my ears, and I had to look up at the old man when he spoke. “There’s a nice family from the south living in your apartment. I think the wife and kids are up there, but I wouldn’t disturb them if I were you. What’s the point?”
“I have to leave anyway. I should go back to the hospital.”
From a distance, a muezzin called in his faint megaphone voice, sounding like a boy reciting a lesson. I couldn’t lift myself off the sidewalk. A black Toyota Camry parked right in front of us, and Hafez, ever the company man, got out of it. His dark sunglasses made him look like a blind man missing his accordion. “Hello, Joseph. How are you today?”
The old man’s face lit up. “Hafez, I have a complaint to make. Your cousin didn’t remember me.”
“Forgive him, Uncle,” Hafez said, sitting on the pavement next to me. “He’s been living abroad. He doesn’t remember much. That’s what we’re here for.” He put his hands behind him and leaned back. “Did you see your home?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve just been sitting here for a while.”
“Come.” He stood up and stretched, like an athlete before a run. “Let’s go look.”
And Isaac commanded the desert’s red scorpions to disinter Majnoun. From under the shifty sands he was lifted. Atop thousands of stingers he floated, and upon the trail of sun-hardened hair he was placed.
“Rise, my nephew,” spoke Isaac. “Rise and greet the changing landscape.”
“Rise, my hero,” spoke Ishmael. “Rise and meet the new world order.”
Majnoun opened his eyes and moaned. “I long,” he said hoarsely, “to see his face once more, to touch his dark and barklike skin, to rake my fingers through his coarse hair. I sigh for what once was and will never be again. I am no longer one who holds the thread to my fate. Longing is full of unmanageable distances. Thus, my life is forfeit.”
Majnoun and Isaac and Ishmael wept, as did all the animals gathered round them, the desert swallowing the falling tears, leaving their salt to mix with sand.
The desert snakes lifted their heads into the parched air, and one of them said, “Let it not be forfeit. Consider all pleasures life can offer, those that were and those yet to come.”
“Pleasures?” cried Majnoun. “Lewd visions of my pleasures with Layl have collared my wretched soul. My eyes see nothing but his lust, and I wish for nothing but his wantonness.”
“Wait,” begged a camel. “God rewards the patient.”
“Rediscover the enjoyment of eating,” cried a vulture. “Think of what it felt like to contemplate a great meal before you, how it felt to be sated.”
“Food?” wailed Majnoun. “His skin was what I tasted upon waking, and his flavor was what put me to sleep. I hunger for nothing but him.”
“You are power descended from power,” announced a lion of the desert. “You are the mightiest creature of above and below. You can rule us all. We will worship and serve you. Does that not entice you?”
“Power?” moaned Majnoun. “I would rather live life on my knees before my beloved than become the master of all realms. For one more kiss of his lips, I would let the Furies torture my soul for eternity. The tiniest kernel of my being has no desire but Layl, for he has melted into my heart. Power means naught if it cannot fulfill my one desire.”
“I beg to differ,” interrupted the owl.
“About time,” said Ishmael.
“Do you remember how Psyche regained the love of Eros after all hope was gone?” said the owl. “How she survived Aphrodite’s wrathful vengeance and triumphed?”
“But I am not a helpless little girl,” responded Majnoun.
“You are,” said the owl. “You are both Psyche and Aphrodite; both the falcon and the partridge. You are Eros as well. You are the demon king.”
“That was Layl, not me.”
“You are Layl as well,” counseled the owl. “Surrender. Pain is proportional to wanting the world to be other than it is.”
Majnoun’s sun-colored hair rose and burst into flame, his skin darkened and burst into life. “I know you,” he said.
“Of course, you do,” sneered Isaac. “Of all things, he chooses an owl — in the desert, no less.” And Ishmael said, “At least it was not a waterfowl.”
“Remove your mask, Uncle,” Majnoun said. “I see you.”
“And I see you,” responded Jacob the yellow owl.
“Rise, my nephew,” said Isaac.
“Heed your destiny, my hero,” said Ishmael.
“End your sorrow,” said Jacob. “Your mother calls.”
The emir’s wife concentrated on her intention and directed her energy from her stomach up through her right hand to the hairy mole on the supplicant’s upper lip. “Heal,” she cried. She raised her eyelids discreetly, gently tried to sense with her hand whether the hateful mole was still present, then dramatically swung her arm back, announcing, “Behold!”
The line of seekers gasped and oohed. The supplicant’s hand raced to her lips. “It is gone,” she yelled, and the line broke into applause. The emir’s wife beamed, bowed — she had spent a few hours just that morning practicing her appreciative bows — and sat back on the throne. She waited for the clapping to quiet before calling, “Next.”
A full-figured man genuflected before her and kissed her hand. “I am regaining weight, exalted lady,” he said. “It is not yet a crisis, but it will be soon. I do not wish to regress to where I was before your remarkable son touched me. I would not be able to bear it. I was hoping your gloriousness could give me a booster.”
“But of course.” The emir’s wife slid forward, moving the ostrich-feather cushion halfway beyond the edge of the throne. “Come closer. I do not bite.” She laughed at her joke but then sat bolt upright. A sudden current of heat had shot down her spine, from the top of her head to her behind. “Did you do that?” she asked the man.
“Did I do what?”
She hesitated, looked about her. No one in the temple seemed to have felt what she did. She shut her eyes, recaptured her serene self, and wore her gracious smile once more. “Where were we? Yes, come closer for your booster.” She felt it again, stronger, more delicious, more disconcerting. She shivered in momentary glee, considered whether she was having another pleasant metamorphosis. Would that not be delightful? But what if it were not? She had to go on.
“We strive for perfection,” she advised the attendees, “to reflect God’s. It pleases Him mightily when we achieve our ideal shape. Fat people will always earn lower wages, and they are not pleasant to look at. It is God’s plan. To avoid weight gain, you must look to God and worship. He will teach you to love yourself, and love is the cure for obesity.”
The line hummed in appreciation. The emir’s wife glanced to her left to make sure the scribe was writing down every wise word of her short yet exquisite sermon. An unfamiliar movement in the line caught her eye. She glanced up and noticed a man and his wife raising the robe of the man standing in front of them — thirteenth in line — and fondling his genitals. Before she could open her mouth to demand that they stop, she was struck once more with the surge. This time, she felt her soul shake. This time, she knew it was not going to be pleasant. This time, she was not the only one who felt it. The line was no longer straight; some supplicants looked confused, others terrified, still others lustful. One woman turned toward the temple gate and exposed her plentiful breasts. The floor rumbled, the pillars shimmied, and the emir’s wife felt two more surges rush through. Her skin tingled and her vagina buzzed and the temple gate burst into an infinity of tiny shards and toothpicks.