Mansour frowned slightly and did not say anything for a moment, as though thinking what kind of answer best suited her. Finally he said:
"You and your ideas!" He began after the short silence: "Sometimes I feel that your convictions are dangerous! Why don't you open your eyes and see where you are, where you live? Why can't you go along with the reality of your life, our lives in general?"
"Reality of our lives stinks. Look at my poor mother! Yes, I am an idealist. I don't want to be like my mother." She averted her eyes while speaking and remove his hand from hers.
He got up from the bench and walked a little. He lit a cigarette and returned to where she was sitting. He stood in front of her.
"To be too idealistic sometimes hurts people." He said calmly.
"So let us be wounded! At least we know what to do; we can get in a fighting position to defend ourselves, so what!"
"So you don't care to be injured?" He almost demanded an answer from her.
"No, if I must pay a price for my viewpoint, I will pay that price."
"So if I tell you that you can't do certain things when we're married, what would you do?"
"You must be joking! You want to use my love to dominate me! I won't allow it."
"But if I did!" He wanted a straight forward answer.
"Then I don't stay with you!"
There was a silence that ensued. The sky was suddenly darkened in the garden. Quietly the shadows of night crowded from sky to where they were sitting. Things lost their color irksomely.
"You don't know life. You're still a child, a stubborn child." He said bitterly
"Oh," She smiled. "Why are you marrying a child then?"
But before he was able to answer, she continued:
"I want to feel the life, to see it all, to touch all sides of it. For that I even risk my life!"
"Oh, you're so naive. All you think about is rebelling. You say things just to be against everyone else. That is just your habit. I'll bet you'll calm down in a few years when you see your ideas are just ideas and nothing else."
"We see!"
"Are you angry at me?" He asked her discontentedly.
"No!'
"Yes, you are."
"No, I'm not. It's time to go inside. I haven't done my homework yet."
They walked inside the building together. The hallway was dark. A dim light gave a little shade of light at the end of the hallway, where there was a storage room under the stairs. They gazed at each other in silence. She would remember this stare for the rest of her life. To her, his desirous and fervent glare grew intense. She saw that his glance pierced her through her deepest and most internal awareness. She shuddered. He saw it. He offered his hand. She refused it.
"I'm going home now. Can I hug you?"
She looked bewildered. A minute ago he was explosive; now he was gentle. She was not sure which of them needed the other more. She slowly put her arms around his neck. He kissed her for the first time, a prolonged kiss.
She went to her room and wrote a poem that showed her ambiguity about their relationship:
"The part of my body choose
To do things beyond my command.
But when life doesn't confuse,
They listen to me like a friend.
When my eyes see enchanting change,
They glow with a fire of gale.
When my soul is not strange,
It diminishes the color of pale.
When my head craves for ease,
It doesn't hurt of a constant pain.
When my legs carry me to breeze,
They endure the nature, sun or rain.
At times, love melts into sky.
Mind is tired of what we've done.
Obscurities won't be untangled, they die.
Eyes loose the sight of what we've begun
When they only want to see why!
A beloved, who has searched for long,
Comes upon her love, where ever it was laid.
Love has a new look, like a new song;
Echoes in air, as we are over our dread.
It has a genuine feeling, no longing for wrong;
But is it this new born love what we've said?"
To Be Continued
No comments:
Post a Comment