Earth and Ashes - Atiq Rahimi [0]
THE PATIENCE STONE
A THOUSAND ROOMS OF DREAMS AND FEAR (forthcoming)
For my father, and other fathers who wept during the war
Contents
Cover
Other Books by this Author
Title Page
Dedication
A Note on the Text
First Page
About the Author
Copyright
He has a great heart, as great as his sorrow.
—RAFAAT HOSSEINI
A NOTE ON THE TEXT
Reference is made in Earth and Ashes to the great eleventh-century Persian epic, the Book of Kings (Shahnama in Persian) by Ferdusi. This famous poem interweaves Persian myths, legends, and historical events to tell the history of Iran and its neighbors from the creation of the world to the Arab conquest in the seventh century. Even today, storytellers can recount large parts of the Book of Kings from memory. The characters mentioned in Earth and Ashes are:
ROSTAM, son of Zal, the great hero of the epic, who, in a battle, kills his son, Sohrab, whose existence he did not know about.
SOHRAB, son of Rostam, born from Rostam’s secret union with Tahmina, daughter of the King of Samengan, who finds himself on the opposite side from his father in battle and is killed by him.
ZOHAK, the legendary tyrant of the epic, who ruled with serpents who fed off the brains of the young men in his kingdom.
“I’m hungry.”
You take an apple from the scarf you’ve tied into a bundle and wipe it on your dusty clothes. The apple just gets dirtier. You put it back in the bundle and pull out another, cleaner one, which you give to your grandson, Yassin, who is sitting next to you, his head resting on your tired arm. The child takes it in his small, dirty hands and brings it to his mouth. His front teeth haven’t come through yet. He tries to bite with his canines. His hollow, chapped cheeks twitch. His narrow eyes become narrower. The apple is sour. He wrinkles up his small nose and gasps.
With your back to the autumn sun, you are squatting against the iron railings of the bridge that links the two banks of the dry riverbed north of Pul-i-Khumri. The road connecting northern Afghanistan to Kabul passes over this very bridge. If you turn left on the far side of the bridge, onto the dirt track that winds between the scrub-covered hills, you arrive at the Karkar coal mine …
The sound of Yassin whimpering tears your thoughts away from the mine. Look, your grandson can’t bite the apple. Where’s that knife? You search your pockets and find it. Taking the apple from his hands, you cut it in half, then in half again, and hand the pieces back to him. You put the knife in a pocket and fold your arms over your chest.
You haven’t had any naswar for a while. Where’s the tin? You search your pockets again. Eventually you find it and put a pinch of naswar in your mouth. Before returning the tin to your pocket, you glance at your reflection in its mirrored lid. Your narrow eyes are set deep in their sockets. Time has left its mark on the surrounding skin, a web of sinuous lines like thirsty worms waiting around a hole. The turban on your head is unraveling. Its weight forces your head into your shoulders. It is covered in dust. Maybe it’s the dust that makes it so heavy. Its original color is no longer apparent. The sun and the dust have turned it gray …
Put the box back. Think of something else. Look at something else.
You put the tin back into one of your pockets. You draw your hand over your gray-streaked beard, then clasp your knees and stare at your tired shadow, which merges with the orderly shadows cast by the railings of the bridge.
An army truck, a red star on its door, passes over the bridge. It disturbs the stony sleep of the dry earth. The dust rises. It engulfs the bridge, then settles. Silently it covers everything, dusting the apples, your turban, your eyelids … You put your hand over Yassin’s apple to shield it.
“Don’t!” your grandson shouts. Your hand prevents him from eating.
“You want to eat dust, child?”
“Don’t!”
Leave him alone. Keep yourself to yourself. The dust fills your mouth and nostrils. You spit out your naswar next