It is winter, and the gray sky holds no light even in midday, so I find myself imagining us walking together, far away from this place of dank air and garish artificial lights, in a place burned by the sun but also blessed with shaded, cool places where the air is very soft.
We walk together beneath the candy-striped arches of the Grand Mosque, deep inside its labyrinthine heart, beyond the whitewashed, winding narrows of old Cordoba, where Maimonides once lived, thought, wrote, prayed, perhaps loved. He was exiled from this place, but his presence is felt still.
We walk together, and do not speak aloud, and the sound of our footsteps echo harmlessly through this place, this sanctuary, where we are unnoticed by the others who walk around us, and glide through the walkways which never seem to end.
An old, Gothic cathedral sits inside the mosque, as if dropped inside it from overhead by a giant hand, and we linger a moment or two inside the choir. We overhear a guide speak of Visigoths, Moors, Reconquista. She speaks also of a courtyard, where she says there are orange trees.
We wind our way through the red and white stripes, the endless tunnels, until we find the mihrab, its walls richly decorated, and then into the courtyard, where we shield our eyes from the sudden light of the blazing Cordoba sun.
There are indeed orange trees. They have a delicate scent and glossy green leaves, rustling only slightly as there is a mild wind. You move next to a tree, and pull me close to you so we are both touched by the leaves. I breathe deeply to take in the scent of the trees, the water of the fountain, the warm summer air, and then you stop me with a kiss.
We go to the edge of the fountain, and I say we should make a wish by throwing in a coin, although nobody seems to be doing this. You fumble in your pockets and pull out a golden ten Eurocent coin, and we deem it lowly enough to part with. I close my eyes, to make a wish, and I feel your hand grasp mine, and you press your face into my hair, and we toss it in together.
I hear the coin rend the water in the fountain. I do not speak my wish aloud. You do not ask me what I have wished for. There are many people standing around the fountain, and I sense them watching us, even though they are not. We leave the mosque.
We walk through the streets of Cordoba, narrow, old streets with whitewashed walls, more like alleys than streets. Little archways reveal shops and restaurants and apartments beyond the walls. We glance inside the openings as we walk by. We see the entrance of a courtyard with a tiled fountain, and we pause. I say that I would like to live here, but you just laugh and we move on.
After walking for a while, hand in hand, past the statue of Maimonides, we come to a crowded tavern, where people are eating, drinking, talking, and laughing. We find an empty table toward the back of the tavern, and sit, and I look at you across the table. You don’t speak. There is a small window next to our table, and through it, a courtyard.
Somehow, it is the same courtyard I saw earlier, although it seems impossible. Have we walked in circles? There are pale yellow tiles lining the small fountain, which holds a still pool of water, and birds strut on the fountain’s edges, picking at seeds and leaves with their beaks.
Light trickles into the courtyard, dappling the tiles and the face of the water and the wings of the birds. Afternoon is waning, and the light will soon be too low to enter the courtyard. The tavern is noisy, but the courtyard is still, except for the sound of the birds’ feet on the tiles. Our wine arrives.
The waiter has black bristles on his angular, lined face. His whiskers remind me of yours when you don’t shave for a few days. He pours the wine; it is the color of the sun streaming through the orange trees at the mosque. We look into each other’s eyes, smile, touch our glasses together softly, and drink. We will not leave Cordoba.
-- Susan Bernstein
No comments:
Post a Comment