Benyamin - Goat Days

We can endure any misery if we have someone to share it with. Being lonely is very depressing. Words twitched like silverfish inside me. Unshared emotions pulsated, bubbled and frothed at my mouth. An ear to pour out my sorrows, two eyes to look at me and a cheek beside me became essential for my survival. In their absence one turns mad, even suicidal. It might be the reason why people condemned to solitary confinement turn insane.

Getting those words out, expelling them, provides the greatest mental peace. Those who do not get this chance die choking on words. I too would have died like that. But it was through the stories I narrated to my Pochakkari Ramani, my Marymaimuna, my Kausu and Aravu Ravuthar that I threw out those words accumulating inside me. I kept talking to them as if I were talking to dear ones when I walked them, milked them, filled their containers and gave them fodder. I poured out my tears, pains, sufferings, emotions and dreams. I do not know if they understood anything. But they listened to me, looked at me with raised eyes, even shed tears with me. That was enough for me.

In those days when I had only goats for company, there was an occasion when I shared with them not only my sorrows and pains, but also my body. One night, as I lay down, I could not sleep. I didn’t know why, but I was covered in sweat. I had an insatiable desire, a passion building up inside me like a desert storm. For some time, I had been impotent. I did not think I would have the urge to be sexually active again. But it happened. What had lain dormant for so long suddenly woke up. All my efforts to satiate it only made me crave it even more. Seductive nude female figures began to slither in front of my eyes. I thawed in that emotional surge. I needed a body to lie close to. I needed a cave to run into. I became mad. In the intensity of that madness, I got up and rushed out. When I opened my tired eyes in the morning, I was in the masara. With Pochakkari Ramani lying close to me.

The desire to see Hakeem again also increased after I learned that he was in the neighbouring masara. My eyes had this craving to see another human being. He was also searching for ways to meet me. We realized that we had not run into each other in the desert till then because we had been taking our goats in different directions. Between our two masaras, there was a small valley. It ruined all the chances of our meeting. Slowly, however, I started going towards that valley. I began to spot Hakeem at a distance. He too started moving towards me. We began to meet though the arbab often scolded me about it. But I didn’t heed his words. My fear of him had vanished through constant exposure to it. What would happen? Some rebuke, some smacks. I had got used to both.

Hakeem’s arbab was worse than mine. Sometimes he told me about the torment he had to undergo. His arbab’s pastime included flicking boiling water on Hakeem’s face, pulling his hair, poking a stick into his backside, kicking his chest, dunking his head in water, etc. Therefore Hakeem was very afraid of our meetings being detected by his arbab. On the occasions when he actually came, he would run away after saying a word or two. We even devised ways to meet each other. For that, I would poke a stick into a goat’s anus or twist its tail. Then the goat would run crazily. I would run after it and hit it, which would make it run even faster. Thus, somehow, I would get near Hakeem. When the arbab looked from afar through his binoculars, it appeared as though I had reached the place chasing a runaway goat. We would quickly exchange a word or two. Our conversation would end there. It had to end there. If we spent even a little more time, the arbab would arrive in his vehicle. Just imagine how much we had to restrain ourselves to squeeze in all our thoughts into two pairs of words. A person who has the opportunity to talk incessantly all through the day would not be able to easily relate to my torment.

One day, I was sitting on a sand dune, watching over the goats. I could see Hakeem with his goats in the distance. I thought about going up to him for a chat. But the arbab hadn’t taken his eyes off the binoculars. His supervision had increased in the past few days. He had in fact strictly forbidden me from meeting Hakeem. It could be that he feared our frequent meetings might kindle in us a desire to escape together. But the reason my arbab gave me was different — that there might be germs and diseases in the other masara which could spread to our masara and to our goats through my contact with Hakeem. To tell you the truth, I felt like laughing — as if my masara was the abode of hygiene!

Anyway, I suppressed my desire to talk to Hakeem. I could somehow bear with the beatings and scoldings, but why should I push Hakeem towards the same fate?

Maybe because of that distant view of Hakeem, suddenly I was struck by the thoughts of the homeland. It did not happen very often during my life in the masara. All my longings rose in unison inside me. My Sainu, my ummah, my son … my daughter …? My house, my canoe. How many times had I heard about the nostalgia of the diaspora? It often surprised me later that I never grieved for my shattered dreams even in those hostile situations. I think such thoughts come only to those who can see an exit. I never thought that I would escape from the hell I was in. Once trapped, I carried on living with no hopes of escape. The dead don’t dream about life. But that day, a faint hope that I might also escape sprouted in me.

Merciful Allah, you perform great miracles in the lives of many: a beggar strikes gold by winning a jackpot, a sick man regains his health one fine morning, the victim of an accident leaves the place without a scratch, one person escapes while hundred others perish in a plane crash, a shipwrecked sailor makes it to the shore, someone comes up alive weeks later from the ruins of an earthquake. How many such events challenge common sense? Won’t you make such a miracle happen in my life? You just need to will it. What if a hay truck driver stopped his vehicle for me? A water truck man transported me to a safe place? Why, what if the arbab himself took pity on me and sent me back? Your will alone is required, your benevolence. I looked at the heavens. There were pale clouds floating like orphans, showing me no sign of hope.

It was then that I saw two billy goats locking horns. When these goats locked horns with each other, they turned twice as aggressive. They would stop only when their horns would break and heads bleed. The fury one male had towards another! I ran towards them and hit them. Seething with anger, one moved away. The other turned towards me and breathed fire from his nostrils, locking his eyes with mine. He drew all his fury to his horns. I didn’t budge from where I stood. As he leapt at me, I evaded him quickly. I had learned the manoeuvre from experience. A goat would never attack abruptly. It would stop, take aim and then leap. Until then, one should remain still. Dive away as it charges towards you. With the momentum carrying it forward, it can’t change direction. That’s the only way to dodge the charge of a billy goat.

As the goat lost its target, it nosedived into the ground. The fall took away its fury. Somehow it got up and went away in another direction. The goat’s fall had made a depression in the sand. When I looked there casually, I thought I spotted something. There was some evidence of previous digging. Tense, I walked up to the spot. The sight stunned me. I glanced at the arbab. He was resting, his eyes off the binoculars. I sat down and began to dig slowly. My suspicion came true. I jumped up horrified when I saw it. It was a human palm! A palm rotting away to the bones. With intense fear and anxiety I started brushing away the sand. I had merely removed a layer of the earth when a human skeleton came into view. I was really terrified now. As I stepped back, something struck my foot. A leather belt that had not yet decomposed. A belt that looked familiar. Suddenly, lightning struck me. I had seen that belt on the waist of the scary figure who had disappeared from the masara the third day after I reached.