She sits opposite me. There is no power and there is nothing to do. We have not talked for a while.
An incomplete, incoherent philosophy changed her life.
My legs swing from the charpai. I think my impatience is well-disguised. As always.
"You know..ive just never..believed. When we were children and Mama made me pray, i just couldnt come up with an image..something up there.." She's saying,almost apologetically.

So it is as I thought, you are using a school of philosophy to make an excuse, to justify your disbelief. The intellect is not even involved. Whatever fits your preconcieved notions becomes your way of life? What of investigation, of contemplation, of exploration?
I am monotone, seemingly detached.

Tell me, according to existentialism..how would you punish a man for killing another? What would you do in a court of an existentialist state? What would Sartre say about capital punishment? Is murder wrong? I ask. The sickness at the bottom of my stomach seeps to my throat and i know my voice wavers.

She falters to my satisfaction,expectation. She tells me she is not sure, she cannot say there is only one way to look at it, different existentialist philosophers would have different views..
She doesn't know and doesn't care, she just loves the way it makes her feel. It makes so much sense. It frees her. To draw,to feel, to create art.She always felt this way and then she found out an entire generation had verbalised it. She is reading more and more. Being and Nothingness at least 4 times. She laughs with joy as she tells me its her Bible now.

I feel helpless.

We continue to talk untill i hear the Adhan.
Ive lectured, ive questioned, ive listened. I have pretended to understand. I have tried not to preach. I have tried to understand the completely irrational reasons, the emotional reactions behind her new belief system.

Little does she know how we will never be the same again. To me. She is an alien. The Other.
My own flesh and blood.
Little does she know i died a little inside that day.

As i look back with honesty, alone in candlelight,my self-righteous indignation is shed,discarded with my clothes. Who is responsible for this? An infant, born into the Truth not believing,not desirous of knowing?
I change and bend my head in a tearful prostration, a sinner like any other.
Subhana Rabiyul-Allah. Subhana Rabiyul-Allah. Subhana Rabiyul-Allah.

I pray to the Creator she doesn't believe in.
I slam my fists against the prayermat.
Almost enraged at the God who never gave her faith.

Dha Dhin Dhin Dha. x
Dha Dhin Dhin Dha. x
Ta Tin Tin Ta. o
Dha Dhin Dhin Dha. x

You should put a bandage on that, she says as soon as i take off my red pumps. Bright red with white bows. She cares so much for a physical wound she can see when those inside are worse. I smile at the irony.

It's fine, I reply.She stands there feeling awkward. I make no attempt to change that. Come! I say. A order not a request.
The grass,my dear,Mrs S says..the rough texture of it stimulates the nerve endings at the soles of the feet..I need to wake up I tell her.
Freak, she says.
I gently push aside that strand of hair that always seems to be in her eyes.

Its because you are doing too much. She says.
I need to. Im intoxicated by all this activity, this learning, synergy of mind, body, soul. I say back, calmly but in that tone that tell her she must back off now.
You should drink rocketfuel. I wish I was like you. You scare me.

Her words filter through my thoughts. My pumps are back on my feet.
I don't enjoy scrutiny. My voice is solid.
I care, she says.

Find someone else to worship I say as I fix her right collar,not making eye contact.
I walk away feeling violated.

The wound is bothering me. Intense pain every time i lift my foot. Ipass by the dean's office. No you cannot go in, meeting.Bottom step, at last!

I look up. He is standing in the middle, like he is meant to be there.Making my linear path look like the middle of nowhere, wilderness. I raise an eyebrow, are you meant to be here child? Im assuming that's his parents standing about yard away. Patterned Chaddar, black andwhite. Leather Moccasins. Huddled together.Hushed conversation.

As if by instinct,despite myself, i smile the second our eyes meet.You are so cute and small, the Maker made you to be smiled at!Amused at my surprise, warmed by his purity.He has a dazzling smile, returning mine as if we had been long lost friends from ieons ago. Don't worry I am meant to be here.
His eyes arewise, knowing as if we are both privy to the secret joke of life. Patterned Chaddar and Leather Moccasins would'nt know, he says, they take it all soseriously. But i can see that you understand.Our smiles spread together, till they convert to a low laughter justbefore i reach where he is standing.
He looks about 3. A moptop of thick,silky black hair. Tiny Shoes.

The Unity of existence, the Wahdut al Wujood.

I am purified and by the time i reach the Arts block i feel strangely new.
Your slate is always clean and disillusionment never lasts, Oog had said after the Great Betrayal.Words i had discarded then in my selfish, cynical misery. Misery makes us selfish.Isn't that what i preached to her only days ago the night of the storm on my rooftop?

The cycle of life. Death, birth, renewal.I am the dust at the feet of Tiny Shoes, and he is the tears in my eyes.