T.N. Murari

He moved toward the small side gate but grabbed Jahan’s arm. “You too will be beaten by the Talib. Look at your lungee!’ My brother’s turban was perched – illegally – on top of his unruly hairs, a show of adolescent defiance. Abdul flattened Jahan’s curls and then pressed the turban down to his ears so the hair was completely hidden.

I was beaten yesterday by a Talib because I did not pray. What do they expect?” He could afford to be indignant behind our compound walls. “I’m suppose to just stop doing what I’m doing and drop down to pray– five times a day too, as if I have nothing better to do and God has nothing to do than listen to us? Before they came, I prayed once a day and went to the mosque on Fridays. God doesn’t want to be reminded of our presence so often.

"You women are lucky behind your burkas," he continued. "You don’t have to grow beards and pray five times a day. I was handsome without this," he said, tugging at his scruffy white beard, "and now what young girl will want to marry this old man?"

I could only speak only to women and spoke to the men through my brother. It felt as if I was in a foreign land with a translator interpreting my questions and giving me the answers

Taliban edicts, tattered and frayed but still menacing in their message, were reproduced in large notice pinned to the walls :

WOMEN SHOULD ONLY BE SEEN IN THE HOME AND IN THE GRAVE

We were only reproductive beasts to them, like goats, or chickens, or cows, fed and watered to await our slaughter should be break free. Our role was defined only by our wombs and not by our thoughts and feelings. All in the name of God. How does a woman believe in God when the conduits of his messages are only men ?

I dressed in jeans and a blouse but did not look in a mirror. My face would be pasty, the color of watery flour, and as soft as dough. It wouldn’t have the flush of health and exercise, or the light tan of an afternoon in the sun. I didn’t want to look into my eyes– they would be dull, and set in deep purple circles. Like all women I existed only in the house, or else covered with my burka in the street.

What crime I had committed now ? Had I revealed my face, accidentally, to a stranger ? Had I, accidentally, spoken out loud in the bazaar ? Had I, accidentally, revealed an ankle or a wrist? Who knew what rules were encircling us like serpents in a pit.

J'étais allongée, recherchant le sommeil et rêvant à Shah Jahan. J'aurais préféré dormir à la belle étoile pour contempler l'immensité des cieux. Cela me fascinait et m'émerveillait . Dans cet univers si vaste, Dieu paraissait encore plus grand et nous plus petits encore. Même le Grand Moghol n'était qu'une chétive créature en comparaison . Cela me redonnait espoir.

Nous pensons beaucoup à l'amour, nous le désirons et nous rêvons de lui, mais nous ne savons jamais quand il va naître ni avec qui. Toute notre vie, on reste dans l'ombre, et soudain on se retrouve en pleine lumière. On croit que l'arbre a bougé, mais c'est le soleil qui s'est déplacé et qui vous a débusqué. Il vous réchauffe d'abord, puis il vous brûle.