Layla and Majnun (9 page)

M
ajnun dragged himself along like a wounded animal. Grief had emaciated him; there was hardly a breath of life left in his whole body. The only picture in his mind was that of Layla; it was her face that he saw whenever he closed his eyes, and it was her image that remained whenever he opened them.

He longed to speak to her, but how? Knowing that he would never be able to recite his verses to her in person, he engaged the wind as his messenger. As he sang his haunting songs of love, the wind carried his words away … but without response.    

The wine of unrequited love is as bitter as wormwood, but so great was Majnun’s passion that he could not refuse to drink. And as he drank, so his verses continued to flow:

A
nd Majnun’s father, the old Sayyid — what had become of him during this time?

Age and sorrow had bent his back and turned his hair white. He was like Jacob robbed of his beloved Joseph, only worse: Jacob at least had other sons to console him in his grief, but Majnun’s father had only Majnun and was thus destined to suffer alone. He could see his own fate only too well, and it was blacker than the blackest night, a night without end.

And his days were as dark as his nights. He would sit in a corner of his tent, waiting for the signal that would herald his departure to that last, eternal resting place. He knew that the signal would not be long in coming, for already he had passed the three signposts of Sorrow, Weakness and Old Age.

There was only one tie that still bound him to the
world, and that tie was Majnun. The old Sayyid was not afraid of death. But he was afraid that he might die without seeing his son, the light of his eyes, just one more time before he departed. He had little to leave him — worldly possessions counted for nothing in his eyes — but it grieved him to think that the little he did have might go to a stranger rather than to his own flesh and blood.

And so he resolved to find Majnun and talk to him one last time. Perhaps he would be able to make the boy see sense; perhaps he would be able to persuade him to detach his soul from the desert, to rescue his heart from his obsession.

The hope of seeing Majnun once more was the rock upon which his fragile existence now depended; it was the rope that bound him tenuously to the life of this world. And so, staff in hand, he set out in the company of two young men from his tribe, confident that his Lord would lead him to his goal.

The journey was a tortuous one, even for the youths. They crossed vast plains that baked in the sun’s fierce heat. They encountered desolate mountain passes beneath towering volcanic peaks. They were bitten by mosquitoes and desert midges, and their feet were blistered from the scorching sand. From oasis to oasis they moved, resting overnight and asking every passing stranger for news of Majnun.

After several weeks, it seemed that they would never reach their goal. But finally, just as the old Sayyid feared that he would expire from the heat and the dust and the hopelessness of it all, they met an old
Bedouin who had news of Majnun.

‘You are looking for Majnun?’ he said, his eyes widening. ‘Then I can help you, for I know where he is! It is a God-forsaken place, a desert cave that resembles a pit in the flames of hellfire itself. I would not advise you to go there — unless, that is, you are unafraid of death!’

The old Sayyid’s young companions begged him to turn back, but he would have none of it. And so they set off once more, this time in the direction given to them by the old Bedouin, and after a full day’s journey they arrived at their destination.

The place was so desolate, so bleak, that it made the travellers weep. And when they found Majnun — or, at least, the creature they assumed was Majnun — they had cause to weep some more. The old Sayyid hardly recognised him as human, let alone as his own flesh and blood. Majnun was no more than a few thin bones, held together by filthy rags. He moved on all fours like a beast of the field, like some grotesque spirit from the underworld that rises from time to time in order to haunt the world of men. His hair matted, his skin caked with grime, he writhed in the dust like a serpent on the edge of death. It was a sight to move the hardest of hearts.

Overwhelmed by love and pity, by compassion and sorrow, the old Sayyid fell to his knees and clasped his son to his breast. Tenderly, he ran his fingers over his face, wiping away the dust and the dirt with his own tears. Majnun looked up at his father, yet he did not see him. Who was this old man and for whom was he
weeping? He stared into his father’s face but did not recognise him. How was he to recognise his father when he could not even recognise himself? He looked the old man in the eye and said, ‘Who are you? Where are you from? What do you want from me?’

‘I have been searching for you all the time, my son’, replied the old Sayyid.

When Majnun heard his father’s voice, he recognised at last who the stranger was. He fell forward into the old man’s arms and began to weep uncontrollably. The old Sayyid kissed his son’s cheeks and pressed him so hard to his breast that his heart was fit to burst. For several tearful minutes, they remained in each other’s arms.

When they had both regained their composure, the old Sayyid took from his bag a cloak of the softest silk, a fine pair of leather shoes and a turban of white damask. It was not fitting that his son should walk around like one of the living dead, like a corpse resurrected in nakedness from the grave on the Day of Judgement; something clearly had to be done. Majnun, for his part, cared nothing for clothes, but in obedience to his father he put them on.

Then the old Sayyid sat his son down and began to speak with him kindly, but firmly.

‘Dearest heart!’ he said, ‘What kind of place is this in which to rest your head? Have you really chosen this hell as your hiding place? Is this your way of asking Fate to finish you off, to give your body up to wild beasts once you have died so that they may pick at your bones and devour your flesh?

‘I beg you, escape while there is still time. Even the town dogs have a better life than you have here.

‘Have you really come so far for so little? Believe me, nothing will come of running away; run until the day you die and still you will get nowhere. What use is all this suffering? What good does it do? Who does it help? Do you want to undo yourself completely?

‘You must try to overcome your grief; if not, it will overcome you. It will consume you completely, for you are not invincible.

‘For too long you have rebelled. Enough is enough! You have to learn to accept things as they are: the world will not change on your account, especially if you turn your back on it. Why do you live among beasts in this wilderness? Why do you hide away in this foul cave, a demon poet feasting on his own sorrow?

‘Try to tear your mind away from all this; try to think of something else, something trivial and of no consequence. Laugh and joke and be happy; yes, it will be false at first but soon the laughter will become real! Indulge yourself, lose yourself a little in the pleasures of the world.

‘And why not? That is life. Life blows hot and cold and you must learn to accommodate it. And whether its promises are true or false, you must learn to enjoy each moment as it comes. You must seize the day, for tomorrow is not to be trusted. Enjoy what you have now! Reap what you have sown now! For today is your day: tomorrow belongs to death, and to death alone.

‘Nothing counts but what you have achieved so far: a woman can wear only the clothes she possesses; a
man can reap only what he has sown. If you hope to achieve greatness in life, you must begin today.

‘You must treat life as though this were your first day and also your last. Behave as though death were at your door this very moment; then, when death does arrive, you will have no fear. For only those who “die” before they die may hope to escape death’s jaws.’

The old man brushed a tear from his son’s cheek and continued: ‘All sorrows must cease eventually; bring your sorrows to an end now. Come home with me. Are you a ghoul, a demon? Or are you a man? If you are a man, then you must live like one.

‘O, my son! Come, be my companion once more for the short time that is left of my life. My day is over; for me, night is approaching. If you do not come with me today, tomorrow you will not find me. I have to depart, and you have to don my mantle and carry on in my place. Soon my sufferings will be over and I will be at peace, God willing.

‘My sun is sinking fast, clouded by the dust of a long, long day. The darkness beckons, the night breeze is waiting to carry my soul away. Come, my son, while we still have a little time to share. Come and take my place, for it belongs to no one but you.’

A
t first, Majnun complied with his father’s wishes: for several days he rested, he ate and drank, he dressed in proper clothes like ordinary people, he abandoned his odes and his sonnets, and he listened attentively whenever his father spoke of their imminent return to civilization.

Yet it was a deceit from start to finish. Majnun wanted so badly to please his father that he would have agreed to anything. But in the end, the shame of lying overwhelmed him. He turned to his father and said, ‘You are the breath that gave life to my soul, and that gives life to me still. I am your servant, ready to obey your every command. But there is one thing, dear Father, that I cannot do. I cannot change what Fate has decreed.

‘Dear Father! Yours is a currency minted in
wisdom; mine is a currency minted in love! Yours is the sober language of reason; mine is the wild gibberish of a man made mad by desire! This is how it is; it cannot be changed.

‘Can you not see that I have forgotten my past? The pages of my memory are all blank, the words have been washed away. I am not the man I used to be. If you ask me to tell you what has happened, I cannot say because I do not remember. I know that you are my father and I am your son, but that is all. I do not even remember your name …’

His words trailed away and for a moment he was lost in thought. Now, for the first time, he understood perfectly what Fate had decreed for him. He continued, ‘True, dear Father, you are a stranger to me, but do not be grieved or surprised by this fact. For I too am a stranger: I am a stranger to myself: I no longer know who I am. I keep asking myself, “Who are you? What is your name? Are you in love, and if so, with whom? Are you loved, and if so, by whom?” A fire burns in my soul, a fire so fierce that it has consumed my very being and reduced it to ashes. And now I am lost in a wilderness of my own making.

‘Do you not see that I have become as wild as my surroundings, as savage as the beasts that you see here? How, then, can I return to the world of men? I am alien to them, and their world is alien to me. Do not try to make me go back, Father, because it will not work. It would never work. I would be a burden to you and a danger to others. My place is here, where I can do least harm.

‘If only you could forget that I ever existed! If only you could erase me from memory and forget that you ever had a son! If only you could bury me here and think to yourself: “There lies some poor fool, some drunkard possessed, who reaped what he had sown and got what he deserved.”

‘Dear Father! You say that your sun is setting and you must depart, and that this is why you came to bring me back. But my sun is setting too, for I am drawn inexorably towards death; you could even say that death is within me, consuming me from the inside. If it is too late, it is too late for both of us. Who knows, maybe my departure will precede yours. I have died inside already, and I have all but killed you with grief. So let the dead not mourn the dead.’

F
rom these words the old Sayyid understood clearly that Majnun was his no longer. The poor demented fool was a prisoner in love’s dark citadel, a stronghold from which no-one could free him.

The old man took Majnun in his arms and said, ‘My dear son! You consume yourself in your sorrow, feasting on your own blood. What shall I do with you? You are my pain — but you are also my pride. It is clear that there is nothing more that I can do to persuade you to come with me. And so I shall leave; I shall leave you for my home town, and then I shall leave my home town and depart this world for ever.

‘Hold me tight, dear son! See how our tears flow and become one river? These tears will cleanse me so that I may start out on the road refreshed. Hold me
tight, dearest heart! These last few minutes with you must, I fear, suffice as sustenance for my journey. I have packed my things and am ready to move on. Moving, moving — man is forever moving! And so it must be.

‘Goodbye, my son! Never again in this world will I set eyes on you. Goodbye! The boat that awaits me is ready to sail, never to return. It is strange: already I feel that my soul is breaking free! Goodbye, my darling boy! Never again shall we meet in this world.’

Majnun watched as the old Sayyid and his two travelling companions moved off across the sands. He knew that his father had spoken the truth, and that they would never meet again — at least not in this world. Indeed, just two days after the old man arrived back at his home, he passed away, his soul and spirit free at last.

Each soul is but a flash of light, born to shine for a brief moment before fading for ever. In this realm, everything is destined to perish; nothing is made to last. But if you ‘die’ before you die, turning away from the world and its Janus face, you will achieve the supreme salvation of life eternal. It is up to you: you are your own fate, and whatever is, or will be, lies within you. And in the end, good will be united with good, and evil with evil. Your secret is shouted from the mountain-tops: when the echo returns, you recognise the voice as your own …