The Sand Child by Tahar Ben Jelloun

Author:Tahar Ben Jelloun
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Published: 2023-04-20T00:00:00+00:00

12 The Woman with the Badly Shaven Beard

At the back, not of the stage, but of this story, hangs a wide, multicolored ribbon; swollen by the wind, it becomes a transparent bird that dances on the farthest point of the horizon, as if to give this adventure the colors and melodies it needs. When the wind is only a summer breeze, the ribbon floats to the regular rhythm of a horse galloping to infinity; on the horse is a rider wearing a large hat on which some unknown hand has laid ears of corn, branches of bay, and wild flowers. When he stops over there, at the point when day is indistinguishable from night, on those lands where the stones have been painted by children, where the walls serve as beds to statues, there, in immobility and silence, under the gaze of loving girls, he becomes a tree that stands awake all night. In the morning, the first rays of light surround the tree, move it, give it body and memories, then freeze it in the marble of a statue with arms laden with foliage and fruit. All around is a white, bare space in which everything melts on arrival, turning to sand, crystal, and small, chiseled stones. Opposite the statue of the morning is a large old mirror; it reflects not the statue but the tree, for it is an object with a memory. The clock is a soulless mechanism; it has stopped, worn by rust and use, by time, by men’s breathing.

Friends! Time is the curtain that will soon fall on the spectacle and envelop our character under a shroud.

Companions! The stage is made of paper! The story that I am telling you is an old piece of wrapping paper. It will need only a match, a torch, to confine everything to nothingness. The same fire would burn down the gates and the days. Only our character would escape! He alone would be capable of finding a refuge and the rest of our story amid the pile of ashes.

In his book he speaks of an island. It may be his new home, the hinterland, the hinter-story, the last stretch, the infinite whiteness of silence.

Our character—I don’t know what to call him or her— became the main attraction of the circus. He drew men and women and brought a great deal of money to the owner. He was far from his native city, and his disappearance had little impact on the big, dilapidated house. He danced and sang. His body found the joy and happiness of a youth in love. She hid herself to write. The old woman watched over her. Abbas protected her. Sometimes a man, sometimes a woman, our character was moving toward the reconquest of his being. He no longer slept with the acrobats, but in the women’s tent; she ate and went out with the other women. She was called Lalla Zahra, a name she became fond of. She indulged in no nostalgia; she rejected the flood of memories.

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