Ben Okri - The Famished Road

‘Maybe he’s not well.’

‘Maybe he is mad.’‘Strangethings arehappeningto us.’‘To our children.’‘They say heislookingforthespiritofIndependence.’‘They say he is looking for himself.’‘For his own spirit.’‘Which he lost when the white man came.’‘They say he is looking for his mother.’‘But his mother is not looking for him.’ ‘They say she has gone to the moon.’

‘Which moon? There are many moons.’

‘The moon of Independence.’

‘So he is looking for her moon?’

‘Yes.’

‘Strange things are happening.’

‘Theworld is turningupsidedown.’

‘And madness is coming.’

‘And hunger is coming, like a dog with twelve heads.’

‘And confusion is coming.’

‘And war.’

‘And blood will grow in the eyes of men.’

‘And a whole generation will squander the richness of this earth.’

‘Let us go.’

‘Look at him.’

‘Maybewhatistocomeisalready drivinghimmad.’

‘Maybe he is not well.’

And then the voices drifted away on the air. A bright wind blew over me. The lightness in me found a weight. The invisible hands became my own. Darkness settled over the market as though it had risen from the earth. Everywhere lamps were lit. Spirits of the dead moved through the dense smells and the solid darkness.

And then suddenly the confusing paths became clear. My feet were solid on the earth. I followed the bright wind that made the paths clearer. It led me in a spiral through the riddle of the market, to the centre, where there was a well. I looked into the well and saw that there was no water in it. There was only the moon. It was white and perfectly round and still. There were no buckets round the well and the soil around it was dry and I concluded that no one could fetch water from the moon at the bottom of the well and I began to climb down into the well because it seemed the best place to lie down and to rest in a deep unmoving whiteness. But then a woman grabbed the back of my shorts and lifted me up and threw me down and shouted:

‘Get away from here!’

I followed the waning brightness of the path and came to a place where white chickens fluttered and crackled noisily in large bamboo cages. The whole place stank profoundly of the chickens and I watched them fussing and beating their wings, banging into one another, unable to fly, unable to escape the cage. Soon their fluttering, their entrapment, became everything and the turbulence of the market seemed to be happening in a big black cage. Further on, deeper into the night, I saw three men in dark glasses pushing over a woman’s flimsy stall of provisions. They threw her things on the floor and she patiently picked them up again. She cleaned the soiled goods with her wrapper and put them back on the table. The men tipped over the table. The woman cried for help, cried out her innocence, but the marketplace shuffled on, went on with its chaos, its arguing, its shouting and disagreeing, and no single voice, unless it were louder than all the voices put together, could make the market listen. The woman abandoned her pleas. She straightened her table, and picked up her provisions. The men waited calmly till she had finished and tipped the table over again. I went closer. One of the men said:

‘Ifyoudon’tbelongtoourparty youdon’tbelongtothisspaceinthemarket.’

‘Where will I find another space?’

‘Good question,’ said one of the men.

‘Leave. Go. We don’t want people like you.’

‘You’re not one of us.’

‘Everyone else in this part of the market is one of us.’

‘If you treat people like this why should I want to be one of you, eh?’ the woman asked.

‘Good question.’

‘True.’

‘So go.’

‘Leave.’

‘We don’t want you here.’

‘But what have I done? I pay my dues. I pay the rent for this space, nobody hasever complained about me..’

Two of the men lifted up her table and began carrying it away, blocking the path. The woman, screaming like a wounded animal, jumped on the men, tearing at their hair, scratching their faces, clawing off their glasses. One of the men shouted that he couldn’t see. The two other men held the woman and hurled her to the ground. One of the men kicked her and she did not scream. A thick crowd had gathered because of the blocked path. Enraged voices filled the air. The woman got up and ran amongthe stalls and after a moment reappeared with a machete which she held with awkward and fearful determination in both hands. And, uttering her murderous cries, she hacked at the men, who fled in different directions. The man with his glasses clawed off went on screaming that he had been blinded and he lashed out, flailing, and the woman rushed at him and raised the machete high above his neck and let out a strangled grunt and a great unified voice gathered and broke from the crowd and they surged round her and for a moment all I saw was the machete lifted high above the shadowy heads. Women began clearing their stalls. One of them said:

‘This Independence has brought only trouble.’

And the moon left me and everything became dark and I found myself briefly in a world inhabited by spirits, with voices jabbering ceaselessly. The commotion settled around meand theold man with theash-coloured beard was sayingto thewoman:

‘Pack your things and go for the night. You almost killed someone. You were lucky we stopped you. Go home to your husband and child. Those people will be back. Don’t come to the market for some time. You are a brave and foolish woman.’

The woman said nothing. With a stony face of rugged sweetness, she packed her provisions into her basin. She stopped now and again to wipe her nose and her eyes with her wrapper. All around women were offering advice. She was half-covered in mud. It was difficult to tell what part of her hair was mud and what part wasn’t. When she had finished packing she lifted her basin on to her head and, standingtall, walked through the crowd. The old man disappeared amongst the masses. The moon left me completely and I saw the woman’s face in the lamplights. And when the night stopped turning I saw Mum in the woman I hadn’t recognised. I went after her and held her feet and she pushed me off, forging on in her defiance. And I held on to her wrapper and cried:

‘Mother!’

She looked down, quickly dropped her basin to the floor, and embraced me for a longmoment.Thensheheldmeaway andwithstony watery eyessaid:

‘What areyou doinghere?’

‘I was lookingfor you.’

‘Go home!’ she commanded.

I pushed through the crowd and could hear her sobbing behind me. She stayed behind me till we cleared the market. As we left I saw the old man at another stall, with themoon in his eyes, watchingmewithasubtlesmile.Whenwegottothemain road Mum dropped her basin and picked me up and tied me to her back with the wrapper and lifted the basin on to her head.

‘You are growing,’ she said, as we carried on home.

‘Not everything grows in this place. But at least you, my son, are growing,’ she said, as we made the journey through the streets.

There were lamps burning along the roadsides. There were voices everywhere. There were movements and voices everywhere. I planted my secrets in my silence.

WHEN WE GOT home it was already very dark and Dad was back. He sat in his chair, smoking a cigarette, brooding. He did not look up when we came in. I was very tired and Mum was worse and when she set down her basin on the cupboard she went over to Dad and asked how the day had been. Dad didn’t say anything. He smoked in silence. After Mum had asked him the same question three times, with increasing tenderness, she straightened and was making for the door, mud on one side of her face like a hidden identity, when Dad exploded and banged his fist on the centre table.