Ben Okri - The Famished Road

His voice changed, became more natural, almost gentle.

‘I see the image of two thousand years. I drank in its words. It took many centuries to grow in me. I see a great musician in a land across the seas. Nine hundred years ago. The musician was me. I see a priest, I see a ruler of gentle people. The priest was me, the ruler was me. I see a wicked warrior who killed many innocent people and who delighted in bloodshed. I was him. There was once a soldier stoned to death and fed to the crocodiles in Egypt. I was that soldier.’

‘You’re talking nonsense,’ I said.

He laughed, coughed, and went on talking. His voice got lower and lower. His mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear him any more. His limbs went into spasms. I smelt burning wood. Smoke gathered round his hair. For a moment I thought his fit was burning him up. I touched him. His forehead was cold. His eyes were open, but he didn’t see me. I looked up and saw that Mum had fallen asleep on Dad’s chair. I lay down, shut my eyes, and sleep came to me in the form of green moths. I followed them into Mum’s dreams. It came as a shock to me to find myself in her dreams. She was a young woman, fresh and beautiful, with a white bird on her shoulder. She had antimony on her face, magiccharms round her neck, and apearlon astringround her left ankle. Shewaswanderingthroughasepia-tintedvillage,lookingforDad.Shesawhimup a tree. She climbed the tree, but Dad jumped down and ran to the river. Mum came down fromthetreeand sangasongfromher childhood, serenadingDad’s spirit. She sangto Dad, askinghimnot to go away, begginghimto return, in thenameof love. The river turned a brilliant green colour and the maiden of the water, green, with sad eyes and lovely breasts, with the face of Helen the beggar girl, embraced Dad and took him down to the bottom of the river where there was an emerald palace. Eagles drank wine from silver goblets. Swans told stories beneath the great silk cotton tree. A black tiger with a prince’s crown and the eyes of my grandfather roamed the city precincts, recitingverses fromancient epics, sacred texts that could alter thenatureof things. The maiden took Dad to her palace and washed his feet. In the great hail the frozen figures of warriors followed Dad with their fearless eyes. Antelopes with flowers round their necks came and sat at Dad’s feet. The maiden changed Dad’s clothes and dressed him in rich aquamarine robes. Then a mighty lion roared from the secret chambers. All the statues in the hall began to move. The warriors woke from their enchantment and marched into the secret chambers. The statues were beautiful. Their masks were beautiful. The statues had strange human faces, some had large pricks, some had wonderfully rounded breasts with proud nipples, and many of them had the paws of the Sphinx. Masquerades danced into the hall and presented Dad with gifts. Then Dad was led outside where a car was waiting for him. Dad got into the car. Mumstoodattheriver-bank,preparingtojump inwhenItouchedher.Shewasangry and said:

‘Getoutofmy dream.I’mtryingtodrawbackyourfather’sspirit.’

I didn’t know how to leave. The sun burned down on us and the white bird on Mum’s shoulder flew into the water and Mum disappeared and it grew so hot that my hair became singed, the trees burst into flame, giving off a bright yellow smoke. Butterflies multiplied everywhere, they came from the sun, and they flew round my face, filling me with vertigo and as I coughed they flew into my mouth and I sat up and saw that our room was filled with smoke and when I shouted and chokedAdesmiledoddly inhisjerkingsleep andMumjumpedup andsaid:

‘Azaro, get up! Thecandleis burningour table!’

I recovered quickly and fetched water from our bucket and poured it on the table. Ade sat up and smiled at me.

‘I’m well now,’ he said.

Mum whipped the table with a wet rag, as if it had annoyed her. When the flame had been put out she came and sat on the bed and held my face between her hot palms and said:

‘My son,whatwereyoudoinginmy dream?’

I said nothing.

‘Answer me,’ she said.

‘It wasn’t your dream. It was Dad’s dream.’

Mum sat up. I couldn’t see her face in the darkness. Her sadness made the night quiver.

‘Your father got into the car and went to the village. Your grandfather treated his wounds and soothed his spirit. Then he travelled to Ughelli to buy the perfume that would get rid of the bad smell of poverty. Then he went to the moon. Then he travelled to the land of spirits far away. Many lands. I heard his voice crying out in the sky. They refused him entry to heaven. They sent him past hell, past spirit lands where our ancestors ask one another impenetrable riddles all day long. He came to a country full of palaces, a country of dreams, where the people are invisible, where wisdom and joy are in the air. He went to the law courts of the spirit worlds. I heard him crying for answers. Then he came back and a war broke out and they shot him on the road that he had built.’

I didn’t know what to say.

‘So liedown and sleep. This is astrongnight. I must protect your father’s spirit orit will go away.’

I lay down.

‘Your father is playing a flute,’ Ade said in his own voice. ‘It is sweet music. I didn’t know he could play so well.’

Then the room was silent. Sleep stole over me and I resisted it. Mum ground her teeth on the bed, struggling with Dad. Ade began to quiver again.

‘I’mgoingslowly,’ hesaid.

‘Shut up,’ I said.

Mum was still. I heard her snoring. Sleep came to me in the form of white birds and I saw MumfightingDad in his dreams, tryingto get himto gatecrash his body. Adelay next to me, twitchingthrough thenight in his fits. And his spirit, swirlingand turbulent with blinding energies, began to affect mine. We swirled in the sweet savage torrent of his epilepsy and travelled the red roads of the spirits and arrived at the Villageof Night, wherebirds werelayingout electriccables, whereMasquerades were alchemists, where the sunbird was priest, where the moonprince was a foundling, and where the tortoise was a wandering griot who warned me at the roadside that no story could ever be finished. As dawn approached the Village disappeared and I heard the songs of my spirit companions. In flames, the great king of the spirit world flashed past my eyes. The mountain heaved. I saw a black cat at my feet and I fed it bean-cakes. Ade lay quiet beside me. His past lives had begun to conquer him. I saw that he had not told me the whole truth. I saw his other images. I saw amurderer in Rome, apoetess in Spain, afalconer amongtheAztecs, awhorein Sudan, a priestess in old Kenya, a one-eyed white ship captain who believed in God and wrotebeautifulhymns and who madehis fortunecapturingslaves in theGold Coast. I even saw a famed samurai warrior in ancient Japan, and a mother of ten in Greece.

Then, in the middle of the night, when I was still amongst the images, a mighty cry woke us up. I looked and in the darkness I saw Dad’s face. Then it vanished.

‘What did he say?’ Mum asked.

‘I don’t know.’

‘You didn’t hear?’

‘No.’

‘I did,’ Ade said in the dark.

‘What did he say?’

‘He said: “OPEN THE DOOR.”’

Mum rushed from the bed, tripped over my foot, and hit her head against something. She didn’t cry out. She opened the door and went back to the bed. Mosquitoes and night-moths came in. We slept but Mum got up and woke us, saying:

‘No onemust sleep. Wemust bringback your father’s spirit.’

WE SAT STILL. The wind blew in leaves. The air smelled of the forest and the sleeping ghetto. Strange dreams, floating on the wind, looking for dreamers, drifted into our room.

‘Tell us a story,’ I said.