Page 32 of There Are Rivers in the Sky

H— NARIN

By the River Tigris, 2014

E ver since they arrived in Zêrav and moved in with their relatives, Grandma and Narin regularly leave the village to roam by the River Tigris.

Today, to catch their breath, they sit on a rock where the shoreline fans outwards in an arc. In the distance looms a huddle of low buildings. The villagers have told them that until not long ago these used to be popular eateries, neon lights casting rainbows that rippled on the expanse of water, succulent aromas drifting on the breeze. The menus displayed a range of meat and the daily catch – catfish, spiny eels, barbels. Saltwater species, too – gar, sea bream, anchovy. But the most coveted dish was the grilled carp, masgouf .

Narin, like her grandmother, does not consume fish, just as she does not consume pork or cockerel or gazelle or okra or cauliflower or pumpkin or cabbage or lettuce – all are discouraged by faith. Nor has she ever been to a fancy restaurant. But the sight of them in a state of disrepair makes her sad. She would have liked to know what they were like when they were bustling and full of life.

‘Oh, we have a visitor,’ says Grandma.

Upon tracing her grandmother’s gaze, Narin sees a scorpion darting across the dry earth, having scurried from under a rock.

‘Good day to you,’ Grandma says. ‘Go now, Godspeed. Keep your poison to yourself.’

Narin giggles. ‘Why do you always do this? You talk to trees, rocks, running water.’

Grandma says everything in this world speaks all the time. Just as there is no such thing as absolute death, nor is there absolute silence, for silence, too, converses in its own language and dialect. Milk purrs while it churns into butter; mountains rumble as they crumble; mother goats recognize the bleats of their offspring long after weaning; wolves howl to find their way back home; crickets chirp by rubbing their wings together; and the human soul sighs as it leaves its bodily form and migrates on to the next one. Narin should not be sad that one day she won’t be able to detect these sounds, because, once she follows the rhythms and cadences of life, she will always be able to move in tune with them. A deaf person can still hear the most enchanting music.

‘Yes, but you even talk to dangerous animals –’

‘Shush.’ The old woman suddenly freezes, the furrow between her eyes deepening. ‘There’s something over there in the river.’

‘What?’

‘You stay here, my heart. I’ll go and check.’

Narin does not like it when Grandma leaves her behind, so she silently follows her. As she approaches the Tigris, gathering the last of the light, the hair on the back of her neck stands up. A body is floating in the water.

‘Is that man … is he dead?’

Grandma takes a moment to reply. ‘Poor thing, he was someone’s brother, someone’s son. I’ll see if I can pull him ashore.’

The girl pales. ‘But you could fall in!’

‘Don’t worry. I’ll be careful.’

Grandma removes her shoes and tucks her dress into her waistband. Grabbing her walking stick, she wades into the Tigris, step by cautious step. The water laps against her thighs in wavelets, the stones beneath her feet worn smooth from centuries of passage.

‘Permission, Ava Mezin , I mean no disrespect. Allow me in.’

Thus saying, the old woman forges ahead. When the water reaches her chest, she stops. A brackish, vegetal smell assails her. Stretching out her cane as far as she can, she tries to haul the corpse towards the shallows. An impossible task, it quickly becomes clear. The current is too strong.

Panting, Grandma abandons the attempt. As she watches the corpse drift away, she mouths a prayer in his direction. ‘Death is God’s command – Mirin a’mr ē Xwad ē ya . The son of Adam is but a guest on earth, even if he has all the riches or lives a hundred years.’

The dead man is naked but for a pair of torn trousers. There are purple-red lesions across his chest – which Grandma knows are signs of torture and which she chooses not to point out to Narin. Sorrow colouring her features, the old woman turns around and trudges towards the shore.

‘Do you think he drowned?’ Narin asks, rushing to her side.

‘Maybe.’ Grandma runs her tongue over her lips. ‘We’d better not tell anyone. They’ll be worried, and there is nothing anyone can do.’

‘All right, Grandma.’

Neither that evening nor the next do they mention this incident to their Iraqi relatives. Had they shared it with them, they would have heard the rumours about strange happenings. In recent weeks, all around Nineveh, locals have been disappearing, a shepherd here, a tinker there. Some emerge days later, refusing to speak about what they have gone through, while others never return.

This is why the restaurants have been closing one after another. The ancient river, once pellucid and silver under the sun, is now heavily polluted, not only with industrial waste, military detritus and oil residue but also with battered, bloated victims. So many corpses have been pulled out of the water lately that a Muslim cleric has issued a fatwa against the consumption of fish. The famous carp of Iraq have been nibbling at human flesh. When barriers are put up along the watercourse to trap the debris, it isn’t only waste that they snare. Those tangled in the nets are buried hastily and without autopsy. As cemeteries of nameless souls expand along its banks, the Tigris has turned into a flowing graveyard.

Grandma converses with trees, rocks, running water. Everything, she says, speaks all the time. But this enemy – whomever it might be – stays silent.