When the world was created, there was no light. So God weaved light and water like the weft and the warp. The air became like a knitted soft fabric that we could softly and comfortably wear. Then we made our own clothes out of gluey leaves, frozen drops of snow and sand. We built a house, so the fabric of the world was disturbed elegantly. As if it became an extension of the world as it is. There was no fence around the garden in front of the house, so it was all in harmony: the cabbage grew next to the lettuce and among the beets, the bee jumped from one flower to another and the birds chirped on top of the copse around the house. The yard that surrounded the house was a kingdom of its own, a miniature kingdom of God’s own. And the woman and man? They were wool and cooked the meat and prepared many feasts to celebrate God’s greatest fabric, the sun and the sea. And when it didn’t rain they prostrated along the riverbeds leading to the ocean. But as you can see, it was all a continuation. When God created the earth, he didn’t stop to take a break, so everything was in unison and flow.
The corrugated building blocks around my house, all in the same shape, color and smell made me feel that God was stuttering when he spoke His word. Ta ta ta, he must have said. The muttering streets and the midnights retreats amounted to a feeling of dissonance. The streets didn’t speak my name, nor did the buildings embody the world’s intention to manifest itself in material, so I ran away from the city to the recluse mountain top. I can never call myself a hermit, for I love wine and cheese too much and I don’t know how to make them so I have to go to the town every now and then. And not only that, the wine and cheese are only excuses for deeper longing for my fellow humans, with whom I share the mountain, the tree and the stream of water. And also with whom I share the pain, the suffering and the doubt. So amidst this mess, I sat on the mountain top, peeling a banana that I picked and savorely ate: how was this banana made? And how was the earth created? It all seemed so simple. From here, it all seemed in flow, in stream, no blocking the river with a dam nor policing the ideas of chores and 9 to 5 shifts. Is this freedom? Then it became clear to me as I went down the mountain top, and walked closer to the town I reconciled the vision of the buildings. I saw the houses as the trees: a continuation of some sort. A flux. And I reconciled the market and the cars and even the street lights, they were the components of a different nature. I went down thinking that I would like to live here, and make this a mirror of what I’ve seen from the top. And on the top of the mountain, one is closer to God, you know.
AICHA BINT YUSIF 