Journal of an Ordinary Grief by Darwish Mahmoud. Muhawi Ibrahim

Author:Darwish, Mahmoud.,Muhawi, Ibrahim.
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781935744696
Publisher: Random House Publisher Services

Happiness – When It Betrays

I

They taught you to be wary of happiness because it hurts when it betrays. But from where did it come all of a sudden?

Time conquers you with memories that do not resemble you. You had just left May 15 behind, and you were not able to attach yourself to things that were far from your pores. The grandfather who had bid you to keep an eye on the hill that looked out on the sources of his death had died. Your brother loves to give speeches. He stood upon the ruins and promised that the next funeral would be luckier than the first one. You had not reached the age of thirty, yet nearness to death had given you wisdom. And wisdom demands that you not show your feelings in public.

The specified period of mourning ends with a travel permit. You sneak away from the second funeral and promise your family you’ll be back for the next one, for this is the only occasion that allows you to obtain a permit to travel. How powerful is the tie between motion and death! You had just come out of the fifteenth of May, and you were rushing to get home, not to beat the setting sun but to run away from the fireworks exploding in the streets on the occasion of the nineteenth anniversary of the killing.

What did they say to you last time?

“Knights you are, O Arabs, knights!”

Every night of every year on this date is the day of your suicide, which no one else feels. Often suicide is undertaken just for show. But your suicide takes place in secret. A day descends upon you that pierces your flesh and slowly spreads through your bones like a small continuous earthquake that does not expand or erupt.

The eruption – that is what preoccupies you. You have been waiting for it for twenty years, but then it does not come because your condition cannot be comprehended, and it does not reveal itself. How easy it would be to write a poem that could abort the eruption, and how easy to engage your enemy in a dialogue – to prove what? That you have rights?

And what did they say to you last time?

“Knights you are, O Arabs, knights!”

And if they were to give you everything you wanted, what would you do? Would you be satisfied? Would you stop searching for the source of the eruption? And, can you be secure in your happiness? He who robbed you of everything will not give you anything. And if he did, he would be insulting you. “Be wise, and go back to the soil.” That is what you said to yourself, and you did not answer my question, “If they were to give you everything you wanted, could you guarantee your happiness?” You look back on your days and sort the beautiful slogans you carried, walking with them into prison:

Travel permit!

Freedom of expression!

Equality!

Suddenly you laugh. Equality makes you laugh. And you resist, that you may not be secure in your happiness.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.