Speak Bird Speak Again (38 page)

Equally
as important as sexuality in a marriage relationship, and integral to
it, is the question of offspring. A complex of problems for men and
women alike arises out of the association of sexuality with virility
and fertility. A man feels more manly and powerful when he has
fathered many children, particularly sons, and society confirms this
feeling by offering repeated congratulations and favorable comments
on his manliness. The absence of male offspring makes a man
vulnerable to social criticism, and he would be urged to marry
another woman. Feeling inadequate when the marriage is infertile, he
starts to question his manliness and vents his frustration by beating
his wife ("The Seven Leavenings"). Lack of offspring is
even more problematic for the woman. If for the husband male children
represent manliness and virility, for the wife they are an essential
part of her identity; indeed, a woman without a son has practically
no identity, and no security in life. "The Seven Leavenings"
is a case in point: before pregnancy the wife is guilty of a great
sin, but once she claims to have conceived, her husband dotes on her
and treats her with utmost respect.

Although
it is mentioned explicitly only in "The Seven Leavenings,"
absence of offspring (of sons in "Im Ese") is at the core
of the couple's problem in each of these tales. This point is made
dearly in the case of Minjal, who, alone among all the married women
in the tales, is called by her first name - a name that denotes an
ordinary tool - rather than "Im So-and-So." As her clever
neighbor says of her name, "What! That's nothing more than a
piece of iron!" In the other tales as well, there is a certain
degree of tension between husband and wife. With time on their hands
and no children, the males become dissatisfied with their wives and
start finding fault with them.

The
tales in this group focus on the relationship between husband and
wife at a certain stage in the marriage. Several open with a
stagnating relationship, often caused by the absence of children, and
end with a transformation. Fulfillment may be brought about through
children ("The Seven Leavenings"), by finding the right
partner ("The Golden Rod"), or by a change in character.
"Minjal" is a pivotal tale, in this respect, for it shows
the possibility of renewal. In "Minjal" - as in "Lady
Tatar" (Tale 20), but at a later date in the marriage
relationship – the woman insists on being addressed in a
certain way, thereby guaranteeing respect for herself. But now two
marriage relationships are portrayed: the one between Minjal and her
husband, the second between the gulled farmer and his wife. The
contrast between the two women could not be any clearer. In the
second relationship the teller emphasizes the greed and cruelty of
the husband, whose wife, though pregnant, is less important to him
than a workhorse - merely another useful tool, though admittedly more
precious than a scythe.

FAMILY
LIFE

28.

TELLER:
Once upon a time, O my listeners ... but not until you bear witness
that God is One.

AUDIENCE:
There is no god but God!

Once
there was a girl, the daughter of a co-wife. And, as everybody knows,
a co-wife's daughter usually turns out meaner than her own mother.
Her stepmother hated her, always saying to her "Come here"
and "Go there" and giving her endless work to do.

The
stepmother had a daughter of her own about the same age. One day she
said to her mother, "Mother, I want to go to the countryside
with my sister to gather wood." "Go ahead," said the
mother.

After
the girls had left, lo! a salesman was crying his wares:

"Chick
eggs, chick eggs for sale!

Will
get a girl pregnant without a male!"

Now,
the woman had been wanting to do away with her co-wife's daughter.
She called the salesman over, bought two eggs from him, and cracked
them in a pan. For her own daughter she fried two ordinary eggs in a
separate pan. When the girl came from gathering wood, her stepmother
fed her the chick eggs.

A day
came and a day went, and the girl was sitting in the sun. The woman
said to her, "O girl, come remove lice from my hair." The
girl kept shifting her position and wriggling like this from the
heat. One moment she'd say, "O my father's wife, I want to move
into the shade," and the next moment she'd say, "O my
father's wife, I want to move back into the sun."

The
woman went to her husband. "Look here, my man!" she said.
"Your daughter's pregnant."

"Speak
again," he exclaimed, "and say it's not so!"

"No,
by Allah," replied the wife, "she's pregnant. And if she
isn't, you can have whatever you want."

A day
went and a day came, and the girl's pregnancy began to show. The
woman said to her husband, "O man, get rid of her!"

"I
will," he answered. "Prepare some provisions, and I'll take
her and do away with her."

The
wife brought together a cow pie (she said it was bread), a donkey
turd (she said it was stuffed cabbage), and ass's urine (she said it
was ghee). She put these things for her in a basket and waited.

The
man took his daughter to a place where there was no one coming or
going, then said, "Daughter, wait for me here! I'm going for a
walk and I'll be right back."

The
sun set and it was getting dark. The place was rough, rocks
everywhere! with no one coming or going. What was she to do? She
said:

"Father,
you're taking so long to crap

The
thyme has started to sprout!"

In a
while, look! an old man on a white mare was approaching.

"O
girl," he said, "what are you doing here?"

"It's
my fate," she answered. "I came here."

"And
what are these things you're carrying?"

She
answered, "This is bread," and he said, "May it be so,
God willing!"

"This
is stuffed cabbage."

"May
it be so, God willing!"

"This
is ghee."

"May
it be so, God willing!"

Then
he said, "Look here, do you see that cave?"

"Yes,"
she answered.

"You
must go sleep in it," he continued. "Three or four ghouls
will arrive. One of them will come limping, and right away you must
remove the thorn and bandage his foot."

She
gathered herself and went up to the cave, and before long the ghoul
with the limp arrived, just as the man had said. She went over to him
and removed the thorn from his foot and bandaged it. "No one is
to devour her!" he announced. After that they would bring some
of what they had caught for her to eat. By Allah, a day went and a
day came, and she gave birth.

She
was absent ten, maybe twelve months or more. Her father said to his
wife, "By Allah, I want to go back to the place I left my
daughter. I want to find out what became of her." He went back
to the place he had left her. Looking in the distance, he spied a
cave with smoke rising from it.

"If
you're my mother," said the girl, "come in. If you're my
uncle's daughter, come in; if you're my sister, come in; and if
you're one of my relatives, come in. But if you're my father, keep
out!"

He
begged so much to be forgiven that she opened for him. When he
entered, she felt shy in front of him and went to hide her child.

"Daughter,
it's enough!" he said. "You must come home now."

"No,
father," she answered. "Not only do I not want to go back,
it didn't even cross my mind. I'm alive and comfortable. Allah's
looking lifter me."

"You
can't stay by yourself in this rocky wilderness," he insisted.
"You must come home with me!" He swore divorce and forced
her. She prepared herself, and they set out.

As she
was leaving, she said by the door of the cave, "Father, I forgot
my kohl pencil." She went back for it. Then again she would get
as far as from here to there and she'd say, "I forgot my little
bottle of kohl." She could not find it in her heart to go back
home and leave her baby behind.

They
had not been on their way for long when again she said, "Father,
I've forgotten such and such a thing."

"Why
are you taking the long way around this, daughter?" the father
finally asked. "If you have a son, bring him along!"
Lifting the baby, she wrapped him and brought him with her.

Now,
the ghouls used to bring her everything - money, gold, jewelry, and
clothes. They would carry it with them and bring it to her. She took
a little of everything, wrapping it in a bundle and loading it on the
donkey. They set out on their journey, the grandfather placing the
child in front of him.

When
his wife saw them, she said, "You didn't leave your daughter in
the wilderness. You put her in the lap of luxury! Exactly where you
took your daughter, you must take mine!" "Fine," he
said. "Let's go."

She
went and prepared real bread and stuffed grape leaves for her
daughter. Her father took her and left her in the same place he had
left his first daughter.

"Daughter,"
he said, "I want to go take a crap." In a while the same
old man appeared. "What's this?" he asked. Red with anger
because her father had abandoned her, she answered (Far be it from my
listeners!), "Shit!"

"And
this?"

"Shit!"

"And
that?"

"Shit
also!"

He
would say "God willing" every time, and all her food turned
into that which she had named.

"Do
you see that cave?" he asked. "Go up to it. Three or four
ghouls will arrive. One of them is huge and will be limping from a
thorn in his foot. Take hold of his foot and twist it like this to
increase his pain."

The
girl made her way up to the cave. The ghouls came, and she did as the
man had told her. "Cut her up and devour her!" said the big
ghoul. They ate her all up, leaving only the liver and lungs, which
they hung by the entrance to the cave.

Now,
by Allah, the mother did not wait long for her daughter. "Go
bring her? she said to her husband. "It's been long enough. Just
right." He went. In the meantime she gathered the daughters of
their relatives and neighbors, and she said to them, "Sing! When
my husband returns in a while, he'll give you all gold and necklaces.
Sing!"

Reaching
the cave, the father found nothing of his daughter, only the liver
and lungs hanging by the door.

Meanwhile
the girls were singing, and the mother was dancing in their midst.

The
father, however, was cursing her, "O you daughter of damned
parents! Nothing did I find but this liver and lungs hanging by the
door of the cave. Hey, you! Your parents be damned! I found nothing
but this liver and lungs hanging by the door of the cave."

She,
on the other hand, was saying to the girls, "Sing! Sing! Do you
hear my husband calling? He's saying, 'Sing! Sing!'"

When
he arrived, the husband said to her, "Get out of here! You are
divorced! If people usually swear divorce three times, I hereby swear
a hundred times." He divorced her, and his daughter stayed with
him.

The
bird of this tale has flown; one of you owes another one.

29.

Once
there was a poor man. One day he said to his family, "Let's
cross over to Trans-Jordan. Maybe we can find a better life there
than we have here." They had (May Allah preserve your worth!) a
beast of burden.

Crossing
eastward, they came upon some deserted ruins. When they found an
empty house in the ruins, they wanted to move into it. A woman came
upon them. "Welcome!" she said to the man. "Welcome to
my nephew! Since my brother died, you haven't dropped in on me, nor
have you visited me."

"By
Allah," he answered, "my father never mentioned you to me.
And in any case, we came here only by chance."

"Welcome!"
she replied. "Welcome! Go ahead and stay in this house."

Now,
the house was well stocked with food, and they settled in. The man
had only his wife and a daughter. They would cook meals, and in the
evening the daughter took the woman her dinner. She lived in the
southern part of the ruined town, and they lived in the north, with
some distance between them.

One
evening the girl went to bring the woman her dinner. She came up to
the door, and 1o! the woman had thrown to the ground a young man with
braids like those of a girl gone astray, and she was devouring him.
Stepping back, the girl moved some distance away and called out,
"Hey, Aunty! Aunty!" The ghouleh shook herself, taking the
shape of a woman again, and came to the terrified girl.