from their far-away gaze, great strength descended, there, upon the freezing square where the people were gathered.
“God, O God, bestow upon us the blessing of all the lords, the companions, the followers, the army of your victory, Abou Ibrahim Tounsi, Sidi bel Abbas Sebti, Sidi Ahmed al-Haritsi, Sidi Jakir, Abou Zakri Yahia al-Nawani, Sidi Mohammed ben Issa, Sidi Ahmed al-Rifai, Mohammed bel Sliman al-Jazouli, the great lord, God’s messenger on this earth, the saint of the city of Marrakech, O God!”
The names came and went from mouth to mouth, the names of stars, the names of grains of sand in the desert wind, the names of the endless days and nights, beyond death.
“God, O God, bestow upon us the blessing of all the lords of the earth, those who have known the secret, those who have known life and forgiveness, the true lords of the earth, the sea, and the sky, Sidi Abderrhaman, he who was known as Sahabi, the prophet’s companion, Sidi Abdelqadir, Sidi Embarek, Sidi Belkheir who drew milk from a he-goat, Lalla Mansoura, Lalla Fatima, Sidi Ahmed al-Haroussi, who repaired a broken jug, Sidi Mohammed, he who was known as al-Azraq, the Blue Man, who showed the great Sheik Ma al-Ainine the path, Sidi Mohammed al-Sheikh al-Kaamel, the perfect one, and all the lords of the earth, the sea, and the sky…”
Silence fell once again, filled with ecstasy and glimmers of light. From time to time the pipe music would start up again, slip along, then cease. The men and women stood up and walked toward the gates of the city. Left alone, Ma al-Ainine did not move, bowing over the earth, staring at the same invisible spot on the ground lit with white moonlight.
When the dance began, Nour stood up and joined the crowd. The men were stamping the hard ground under their bare feet, without moving forward or backward, closed into a tight crescent that reached across the square. God’s name was exhaled forcefully, as if all the men were suffering and wrenching their insides at the same time. The earthen drum punctuated each cry — “Houwa! Him!” — and the women cried out and made their voices quaver.
It was music that seeped into the cold earth, that rose into the deepest reaches of the dark sky, that mingled with the halo of the moon. There was no more time then, no more suffering. The men and women were striking the ground with the tips of their toes and with their heels, repeating the invincible cry:
“Houwa! Him!… Hayy!… Living!”
Their heads turned to the right, to the left, right, left, and the music inside their bodies came up through their throats and leapt out to the farthest reaches of the horizon. The hoarse, jerky breaths carried them along on the night as if in flight, lifting them up over the immense desert, toward the light patches of dawn on the other side of the mountains, to the land of the Souss, to Tiznit, toward the plain of Fez.
“Houwa! Him!… God!” shouted the deep voices of the men, drunk with the dull sound of the earthen drums and the strains of reed flutes, as the squatting women rocked their torsos and slapped their heavy silver and bronze necklaces with the palms of their hands. Their voices trembled at times like those of the flutes, on the very threshold of human perception, then suddenly stopped. Then the men took up their thudding again and the harsh sound of their heavy breathing echoed in the square: “Houwa! Him!… Hayy!… Living!… Houwa! Hayy! Houwa! Hayy!” Eyes half closed, head thrown backward. It was a sound that went beyond natural forces, a sound that split open reality and was soothing at the same time, the coming and going of a giant saw devouring the trunk of a tree. Each painful and deep exhalation widened the wound in the sky, the wound that tied the men to open space, that mingled their blood and their lymph. Each singer called out the name of God, faster and faster, head craned upward like that of a bellowing ox, the arteries of the neck like ropes under the strain. The light from the braziers and the white glow of the moon struck their swaying bodies as if lightning were flashing repeatedly through the clouds of dust. Breaths were panting faster and faster, letting out almost mute cries, lips unmoving, mouths half opened, and in the square, in the barren desert night, nothing could be heard now save the forgelike sound of labored breathing in the men’s throats:
“Hh! Hh! Hh! Hh!”
Now there were no more words. It was like that, linked directly to the center of the sky and the earth, united by the heavy wind of the men’s breath, as if, when accelerated, the rhythm of their breath abolished the days and nights, the months, the seasons, even abolished the hopelessness of space, and brought the end of all journeys, the end of all time, closer. The suffering was intense, and the drunkenness from their breathing made their limbs tingle, their throats open wider. In the center of the half-circle of men, the women danced with only their bare feet, not moving their bodies, their arms — held slightly out from their bodies — shaking almost imperceptibly. The dull beat of their heels penetrated the earth, making an unbroken rumble like that of an army passing. Near the musicians, the warriors from the south, faces veiled with black, were leaping up and down in the air raising their knees up very high, like great birds attempting to take flight. Then, little by little, as night went on, they stopped moving. One after the other the men and the women squatted down on the ground, arms outstretched before them, palms turned skyward; only their hoarse whispers echoed in the silence, endlessly repeating the same syllables:
“Hh! Hh! Houwa! Hayy!… Hh! Hh!”
The wrenching sound of breathing was so great, so powerful that it was as if they had all already traveled very far from Smara, through the sky, on the wind, mingling with the moonlight and the fine desert dust. There was no such thing as silence, or solitude. The sound of breathing had filled the entire night, covered all of space.
Sitting in the dust in the center of the square, Ma al-Ainine wasn’t looking at anyone. His hands were holding the beads of the ebony chaplet, letting one bead fall at each exhalation of the crowd. He was the center of the breathing, he who had shown the people the path in the desert, he who had taught them each rhythm. He expected nothing more now. He had no more questions for anyone now. He too was breathing, along with the rhythm of the prayer, as if he and the other men had but one throat, one chest. And their breathing had already cleared the way leading north, to new lands. The old man no longer felt his age, or weariness, or anxiety. Breath passed through him, coming from all of those mouths, the breath that was both harsh and sweet, that increased his life. The men were no longer looking at Ma al-Ainine. Eyes closed, arms outstretched, faces turned toward the night, they were soaring, gliding along the path to the north.
When day broke in the east, above the rocky hills, the men and women began to walk toward the tents. Despite all of those days and all of those nights of exaltation, no one felt tired. They saddled the horses, rolled up the large woolen tents, loaded the camels. The sun was not very high in the sky when Nour and his brother began to walk along the trail of dust, heading northward. They carried bundles of clothing and food on their shoulders. Before them, other men and other children were also walking on the trail, and the cloud of gray and red dust began to drift up into the blue sky. Somewhere near the gates of Smara, surrounded by blue-clad warriors on horseback, with his sons at his side, Ma al-Ainine watched the long caravan stretching out across the deserted plain. Then he pulled his white cloak closed and nudged his camel’s neck with his foot. Slowly, without looking back, he rode away from Smara toward his end.
HAPPINESS
THE SUN RISES over the earth, the shadows stretch over the gray sand, over the dust in the paths. The dunes stand motionless before the sea. The small succulent plants quiver in the wind. In the cold, deep blue sky there’s not a bird, not a cloud. There’s the sun. But the morning light wavers a little, as if it weren’t quite sure.
Along the path sheltered by the line of gray dunes, Lalla walks slowly. From time to time she stops, looks at something on the ground. Or she picks a leaf from a fleshy plant, squishes it between her fingers to smell the sweet peppery odor of the sap. The plants are dark green, shiny, they look like seaweed. Sometimes a big golden bumblebee is sitting on a clump of hemlock, and Lalla runs to chase it. But she doesn’t get too close because she’s a little frightened all the same. When the insect flies away, she runs after it, hands outstretched, as if she really did want to catch it. But it’s just for fun.
Out here, that’s all there is: the light in the sky, as far as you can see. The dunes quake with the pounding sea that can’t be seen but can be heard. The little succulent plants are shiny with salt, as if from sweat. There are insects here and there, a pale ladybug, a sort of wasp with such a narrow middle it looks like it is cut in two, a centipede that leaves tiny marks in the dust, and louse flies, the color of metal, that try to land on the little girl’s legs and face to eat the salt.
Lalla knows all the paths, all the dips in the dunes. She could go anywhere with her eyes closed and she’d
