It was the still, sticky, egg-yolk afternoons that made her think of mothers, sisters, aunts and grandmothers. When the sun is her stinkiest, the salt dissipating from her skin and bubbles on the pores of everyone and everything she laid her eyes on, that was when cotton dresses, floral patterns, gold bands and blue stones felt like ancestral relics that surrounded and protected her.
The air smelled like raw onions softening in ghee, so lunch is on its’ way. Prayer mats infused with frankincense will soon be laid out. Foreheads will touch the floor with gratefulness, some smooth, some troubled. Wrinkled hands will envelope soft palms, opened in prayer like a worn out hard cover.
That is what she liked to call “The Witching Hour”, except it was in broad daylight and it had little do with devils and demons and all to do with tired women who carve out some time for silence and lie horizontally for just a few moments until the onions soften and the rice steams. It was through this hour that she cultivated all of her life’s practices to recuperate and regenerate. Basically to drop down as if dead and stop beating to the drums of one’s heart. All of life’s lessons were compressed in this lingering lethargic moment when the sun angles its rays in that certain way that touched everything and casts no shadows.
And even when shielded from a scorching sun, even when blessed with a great modern fan system that sucks away all the pungent aromas of cooking, even when drenched under a raining cloud, even when all the opposite extremes of the familiarity she knows ensue and play out… when that hour comes, she still smells that salty stink and the stubborn aroma of onions softening in ghee and her body feels suddenly hot and tired. Relaxed. She always has to sit if she can’t lie down horizontally, as if she owes her ancestors to shut inwards and rest.
Beisan A. Alshafei
February 20th, 2024
Beisan's Burble 