Damascus Page 10

  And even in my exhaustion and pain, in my bed sodden from my labours and my blood, I knew what I had to do. Was it the breath of the Lord giving me the voice I needed?

  ‘Dear mother,’ I said to Calliope, my voice contrite, ‘let me take her on my breast. So I can look on this creature and understand my great transgression. Just for tonight. So I can truly know how deeply I have insulted the great Mother and all the gods. So I can prepare for my dishonour.’

  Calliope leaned over and, even though I was unclean, she came so close I thought she might kiss me.

  ‘One night, child,’ she whispered kindly. ‘I will speak to my son, I will intercede for you, daughter, and explain your shame. You can have her tonight.’

  With disdain and revulsion, the midwife lay the child on my chest. My first glance and I was also horrified. My urge was to hurl this insult across the room. But Jesus was there; he was with the child. I forced myself to look at those eerie eyes, the eyes of a crone in the face of an infant. I saw the purple stain desecrating her neck and shoulders. Finally, I was brave enough to touch the tiny nub where the arm should have been. As I held it, the child stopped its mournful cries and gave a slight gurgle.

  I heard the midwife whispering to Calliope. ‘Such an abomination should be destroyed immediately. It is an insult to the Mother to let it live even for a day.’

  The hag rapped repeatedly across her chest and spat to make her disgust known to her gods.

  My hand formed a fist around the nub. The child stirred. I lay my palm on her chest and felt her tiny heart beating. I searched, found her good hand. Instantly her fingers curled into mine and her whimpering calmed. She made small noises of contentment. I heard again my first daughter’s voice.

  The infant remained quiet on my breast. There was no kicking from her as there had been with my sons. At the thought of my boys, I shuddered. I could not abandon them, I did not possess such strength. I dropped my head on the soiled bedding, knowing defeat. But it wasn’t the foul excretions of the birth that I could smell. It was her infant’s scent, the milky fragrance that was stronger than the reek of blood, of man. That scent was fortifying. I placed my hand on my child and I made my vow. I must not be mother and I must not be woman. I must be as a man not to be defeated by this world of men.

  Though I was exhausted, I did not sleep. I waited. I closed my eyes until I was sure that Rectitude was asleep. I had to reject the pity I felt for her. They would lash her a thousand times; the scars from the whip would never be erased. But I could not save her. I had to save my child.

  I prayed. This was the moment of danger. As I rose gingerly from my bed, I squeezed shut my lips and bit back on my tongue to stop myself from screaming. A burning erupted from my womb, searing my entire being, as the afterbirth ran down my legs. I made no noise. I conquered all pain. My arms cradled my daughter, and I prayed that she wouldn’t cry. And, yes, she stayed quiet. You who are always with us, you who are always beside us. There was no time to find my sandals. I crept naked down the dark corridor, hearing my husband’s snores, Philos muttering in his sleep and a whimper from my Leon. Harden your heart, Lydia, I commanded myself. I didn’t pull back the curtains to their chambers to see their faces one last time. I had become as ruthless as a man. I crossed the hearth and was in the yard. Our dog woke and started wagging his tail. My heart froze. But you were with us. The dog shuffled towards me and licked my free hand. It was a warm night, and the plump moon had bathed the world in light. Rectitude had draped clothes on the fig tree to dry. I grabbed a long shawl and wound it around my body and that of my daughter. I opened the gate and stepped into the night.

  I followed the path that winds down towards the distant port and was soon in the street that led to the market square. I was taking a terrible risk. The city was teeming with beggars and thieves, with the hungry and the enraged. Drunks leered at me, beggars sleeping in the alleys awoke and saw me, but thinking me a ghost or a fury dared not call out. And though it was night and all was unfamiliar, I had no fear. I could smell the brine stench of the harbour, I could hear the drumming of the distant waves.

  Two seasons had passed since I had been allowed to visit my brethren, but my feet knew the path, and soon I was at the door of the cottage. I pulled back the curtain and only then did the child in my arms begin to cry.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ came a frightened voice, for we knew how much the ignorant world hated our poverty and our faith.

  That was what we were taught. Not to challenge in fear or anger, but to welcome strangers with love. The timid voice belonged to my sister.

  ‘Clemency, it’s me, it’s Lydia.’

  She came out of the shadows, her arms held out. ‘Is this your child?’

  ‘Yes,’ I answered, and as I offered my daughter to her, I said, ‘Her name is Salvation.’

  I had always known, from when you were a child in my belly, daughter, that I would name you hope.

  If we weren’t with the Lord, if we didn’t know about the coming kingdom, such a thing would have shattered the order of the world: no one was allowed to name a newly born child—no one could dare such presumption. The Mother was an arrogant god, She was cruel. People thought She would answer such impudence by claiming the child. But my sister lived in knowledge not ignorance, my sister came with love and not with fear. She took the infant and held her. She did not recoil. What she saw wasn’t evil; she saw a child.

  She smiled at my daughter, gently stroking the nub of her failed arm. ‘Welcome, Salvation,’ she said. ‘Welcome to the Lord.’

  Overnight the first flowers of spring have emerged. The sun is regaining its power and the days are lengthening. The larks have returned and birdsong fills the forest. They are building their nests; soon their chicks will be born.

  Here, in Antioch, I have learned to love the piping call of the lark. The birds also make Greece their home but here they are more insistent. The inhabitants of this city call the lark their own. They say that this land gave birth to the first of the birds. They have a goddess who claims that name. Soon there will be a festival to proclaim Her awakening. They will sacrifice beasts for her and they will get drunk on wine. Joining hands, they will weave and dance through the streets, imitating the bird’s song. Many of us who are pledged to the Saviour will hide. They will drag us out into the streets, they will beat us, they will tie rope around our necks and march us through the squares, demanding that we sing. There are those who will still refuse to sing. Whatever the punishment, they will refuse.

  When I arrived in Antioch, I discovered that our cult had many followers and many houses. But it distressed me to find that these followers were divided. In one house bonded to the Saviour, the followers live and worship as Judeans do. They do not share their thanksgiving with Strangers and will choose death rather than participate in the celebrations for the false gods. In the ribaldry, drunkenness and singing, they see only idolatry, and to them and to their house of worship idolatry is death. The leader of this house is James, the Saviour’s oldest brother, and though they help the poor and offer charity to the wretched, they will not accept those not born Jewish into their house, and they will not share their worship with us.

  In another house they are disciples of the Saviour but they don’t believe that he has risen. He died on the cross, they say, but there was no resurrection: the meaning of his ministry is in his life and suffering. ‘The kingdom is here,’ they proclaim. ‘We live in it already; it came into being through the words and example of the Saviour.’ They do not marry. They do not bear children. They share all possessions, they refuse to own land and declare against tithes and taxes. They accept both Jews and Strangers, and they will join any festivities—they love to drink and to celebrate. They say, ‘Jesus danced, so we all must dance.’ But their enthusiasm is such that it arouses suspicion—they dance in a frenzy and they sing in such ecstasy and abandonment that it gives rise to fear and to distrust. This house is pledged to the Saviour’s twin, Thomas, and Paul says it cannot
last.

  There is still death, still misery, still suffering, still hunger. Caste still exists, and so does violence; there remains cruelty, punishment and prisons. In their wild abandonment they claim to be in the kingdom of the Saviour, but all around them is the truth of the evil world. How can they last? How can such teaching give any hope to those suffering that evil?

  There is another house faithful to Mary, the Magdalena. And one of Peter, the Rock. There is the house of Judas and the house of John. They are all Jews and they made us welcome when we first arrived. They whispered, ‘He is coming,’ and I, in hushed tones, replied, ‘Truly, he is returning.’ They fed me and they fed my child and for that I will always be grateful. But I was exiled from their thanksgiving. I am a Stranger and cannot be taken into any of their houses.

  I am bonded to the house of my teacher. I am of the house of Paul. And so our fate, that of my Salvation and me, our fate was written at the beginning of Creation and it was fulfilled in this eastern city of Antioch. Paul’s is the true house of justice. For in our house it is not only Paul, it is not only myself, but it is also Salvation who has been made in the very likeness of the Lord. In the coming kingdom that will be understood. Till then, we urge, let us sing and dance as a courtesy to our neighbours.

  How my Salvation loved to dance, to the music of the Lord and the ancient King David, but also to the music of the Greek and Syrian gods. She released sounds that would mimic the songs, singing in the language of the Lord, and she would start dancing as soon as she heard the music, spinning and swaying to the rattle and jangle of the sistrums and tambourines, the pounding beat and echo of the drums, the teasing call of the flutes. When she was a child we would take her out into the alley, through the crowd, swinging her between us as we joined the procession. We were not singing to the goddess, we were singing to our Lord.

  They shunned her. Of course they shunned her. The children called her names, the adults kicked at her if she came near them. Freak, cripple, imbecile. They were the kinder words. Outrage, abomination, abortion were more common. And always the whisper behind my back: ‘You are her mother: how dare you let her live?’ But she was a child and even the most ignorant and the misguided believe it a sin to harm a child. The kindest were full of pity. ‘Poor imp,’ they would say. ‘Poor child—what a wickedness that your mother let you live.’

  She grew taller. More awkward. A young woman and no longer a child. Then they didn’t care if they hurt her. They spat at her in the streets. They set upon her with sticks. They set their dogs on her. They screamed in her face.

  On the first day of spring season, the pipes and drums started at dawn to announce the return of the Daughter to the Mother and the arrival of the lark back into the world. But when I went to raise Salvation, she refused my hand. She refused to dance—she wouldn’t leave our house. With grunts, with silent screams and violent kicks, she made her intent clear. She knew she was not welcome in this bitter world. And I knew then what I had to do.

  My sisters and brothers in Paul’s house tried to stop me. They said we couldn’t survive on the wild mountain, we’d be prey to beasts, to hunger, at the mercy of storms. But I wanted the mountain over the city. The city had rejected my child. In truth, the city had also rejected me. I had learned its language but my Syrian was always clumsy. They knew me as a foreigner, an interloper, a Greek—promised to a faith they despised. Antioch is a city of foreigners: migrants have come here from all parts of the world. But our tongue always betrays us; every time we speak they hear our strangeness. So they push past us at the markets, demand that they as Antiochians are served first. They pretend not to understand my requests and questions. The meanest of them refuse to serve us. I try to do as the Saviour asked and turn the other cheek. That is the fate of the outsider: to always turn the other cheek.

  So it was no hardship for me to leave that city and find refuge on the mountain. Our destiny was ordained at Creation and it has been fulfilled on this mountain top. All the children I have prayed for here, all the abandoned infants, they are my daughters and my sons.

  From here the world below is as distinct as a sailor’s map. I can see the winding avenue of the Roman road that leads to the western gate of the city. That was the road I took when I first came to Antioch, with Salvation still an infant. The first time I had seen a map was on the ship we’d taken; Perseverance had secured a berth for us. A brother in our fellowship was a sailor and he vowed to the captain that I was his widowed sister, heading to our family in Syria with my newborn. We hid the babe in a swathe of flax, so no one could see her face. I looked over the rail and watched Greece becoming smaller and smaller as the ship sailed. I was on the Aegean, I was on that mighty redemptive sea, the sea that had so transfixed me when I first came to Philippi, the sea that led me to the Jews and from the Jews to you, my Paul, and from you to our son, our brother, our Jesus. I had no fear on those waters, even as the craft lurched, as it plunged and rose in those titanic waves. I knew that sea, I trusted its waters. Our fate was ordained at the beginning.

  The love of our fellowship amazed me. We are small in number but we are the spirit and the breath of the Lord. The ship landed in Rhodes and then sailed from Rhodes to Lycia. There we were fed and shown kindness by a house loyal to the Magdalena. A trader in leather took me down the long road, over mountains and coast, through plain and desert, fields and forests, and brought me to Antioch. We survived bandits, brutal soldiers, hostile villagers, wolves and wildcats, days without food and water. But always, somewhere, in a cottage perched on a crag overlooking the sea or from within a cluster of huts on a long and fertile plain, there was a house of refuge. Our fellowship fed us, housed us, protected us, until we came to Antioch.

  I never saw my Paul again. I had no need to: I had his words. Those epistles he sent, those letters of love and hope that the brethren who could read would recite for all of us to hear. Always tender, sometimes admonishing, sometimes mournful, sometimes scolding and sometimes hard to understand. Often I would become lost in the words. But I was always sure of his love. And I always shared his hope. That there is a kingdom that is coming, that is truly coming, that is kinder and more merciful than our world.

  I look down at Antioch, at the Roman road I once travelled and the Damascene road to the south, and beyond the winding river in the distance to the silver haze of the sea. I had no fear on my journey. Wild storms at sea, the crashing of the waves. Bandits and thieves on the road. The weariness and the hunger. Yet I never feared. I did as I was instructed by my teacher. I placed my trust in the Lord. And something more. On those waves, on those roads, I was never happier. I was the most despicable of wretches; I had abandoned my husband and sons and would have been condemned and tortured and killed if this had been known—as is right, according to all peoples and according to all laws. But I was never happier than when I was with my beloved daughter, on those waves and on those roads.

  I find Salvation when I return from foraging in the day’s first light. I know it even before I see her face. Death is a shade, a veil that divides the living from the taken. I walk through this veil, feel its cold touch on my face, and I know Salvation is dead.

  I do not weep. I lift her in my arms. My life on the mountain has given me great strength. Bowed, straining, I take her to the stream where I baptised her. Gently I lay her on the ground.

  Then I start to dig.

  On those hard roads we travelled we always saw lines of crucifixes outside the walls of cities; we walked through the shadows of those gallows. Sometimes I saw them only from a distance, only realising their evil purpose because of the black cloud of the birds of prey that circled above them. Sometimes we passed directly beneath them on the road, the corpses bloated, bursting, stinking of death, the unholy birds pecking at the flesh. Sometimes the soul had not been extinguished, and we would hear the condemned man’s desperate final sounds. I would force my eyes to look, not to turn away. By looking I thought I might finally truly understand the meaning of his dea
th, the death of my son, my brother, my Jesus. And I might know why he was punished so cruelly, why he died so alone. But that understanding did not come. Compassion. Sadness. Sorrow. All that I felt, but not understanding.

  And then I bury my child. I scrabble and scrape at the hard ground, my nails broken, my hands bleeding. I dig deep into the earth, not weeping, determined in my task, sure in my work. It is only when I am finished, when I drag the body of my daughter to the edge of the hole I have made, that I remember the words. Freak, cripple, imbecile. Outrage, abomination, abortion. Witch, dog, hag.

  Then I break. I howl. For this child, for how she was exiled from this world.

  Through the trees, a light pierces the forest. And I understand. The obscenity, the scandal, was not his death on the cross. That is not why the evil world despises him. I know from my journeys that such deaths are commonplace. So many have wept for those who have endured such punishment, so many have suffered such torment. What is outrageous, what the world cannot stand, is that these souls, these children, are to be reborn in a kingdom where the last will be first and the first will be last.

  That promise, that truth, is what is scandalous.

  And I push dirt onto my daughter, there where I had immersed her in running water and made her anew. And I am crying, but these are not tears of sorrow. The light is all around us; our mountain is luminous with light. If not tomorrow, the next day, and if not then, the next. One day soon. Soon he will come back. I am bathed in light. Soon he will return and my Salvation, my daughter, will awaken to a kinder world.

  ‘Become as passers-by.’

  —THE GOSPEL OF THOMAS

  The light, a piercing of the sky, the white of it a flame but without fire. He is racked by tremors, his bones as fragile as the empty shells of the sea. He lurches upright, reaching for the radiance, for heat and for succour, but as soon as he does the light is gone and all is darkness. He falls away from his body and from the world but not before he hears the voice ask, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you pursuing me?’