the room. I try to catch my breath, try to concentrate on the vase of hothouse flowers on the stand next to me: red dahlias, white delphiniums, glass vase, sweetish smell. Perishable flowers, they cost more money than I can afford, but once I saw them in the shop, I couldn’t return home without them.
Like most Lebanese, Joumana speaks rapidly, one sentence dovetailing into another, producing guttural words and phrases as if gargling with mouthwash. I prefer slow conversations where words are counted like pearls, conversations with many pauses, pauses replacing words. I prefer my visitors elsewhere. She’s looking slightly above my chair. Her eyes, the color of quince jam, reinforce her easy demeanor, her loquacity.
“I need to rest,” I say. “The air feels humid.” Pause. “I might be getting a headache.”
Joumana’s eyes suddenly dart from one side to the other, gathering information at high speed. The crow’s feet around them tighten. I shut mine in despair. “Oh my Lord,” exclaims Joumana, “what is all this?” She twirls unhurriedly in place, looking up and down. Her face lights up and glows. “What have you been hiding in here?”
“It’s only books,” I say. “Only books.”
I imagine looking at the room through a stranger’s eyes. Books everywhere, stacks and stacks, shelves and bookcases, stacks atop each shelf, I in the creaky chair that hasn’t been reupholstered since I bought it in the early sixties. I have been its only occupant; years ago its foam molded into the shape of my posterior. The accompanying ottoman holds two stacks of books that haven’t been disturbed in years, except for semiweekly dusting. How many hours have I moved around this room, from nook to nook, making sure that everything is in its proper place, every book in its proper pile, every dust mote annihilated? An unframed circular mirror—when did I put that up and why had I kept it?—hangs by a nail on the door. I’d completely forgotten about it. Every surface in the room shines with dedicated cleanliness except for the mirror, of course. I’ve trained my eyes to avoid my reflection so admirably that I forgot it was there. Helen Garner is right. The vegetable-dyed Kazakh rug with noticeable rips was once a boisterous pomegranate, but the vacuum cleaner, after hundreds of passes, has sucked the fresh life out of it. I found the tortoiseshell floor lamp during the war, lonely and abandoned, outside a building that had just been looted—the pilferers had no use for a reading lamp. I spent an entire week restoring its luster. From one of its elegant metal loops, I hang a pair of reading glasses for easy access. The vase sits on seven books, liver-spotted paperbacks of the Muallaqat; each contains one of the poems with its annotations and essays. My favorite poems, four versions of them scattered, though not haphazardly, around the room.
The Suspended Odes, the Hanging Poems, seven poems from seven poets before Islam. The myth tells us that these poems were once written in gold on Coptic linen and hung on the drapes of the Kaaba in the sixth century. Erroneous, of course, since poems were memorized, rarely written, but a beautiful story nonetheless. I love the idea of a place of worship with hanging poetry, gilded no less.
In Joumana’s apartment upstairs, my reading room, this room, was her daughter’s bedroom. I know that because I heard her music through the years, her dancing with her boyfriend, her walking, her stomping, and, every so often, her yelling and door slamming. She’s now studying for a graduate degree in art or art history in France—quietly, one would hope. In Marie-Thérèse’s downstairs apartment, this was her son’s room, the no-longer-there boy. He was much quieter. I have no idea what Fadia uses hers for. I have never been in their rooms. Why do they feel it’s their right to be in mine?
A draft originating from the still-open front door, an unseemly breeze, brazenly ruffles the
Like most Lebanese, Joumana speaks rapidly, one sentence dovetailing into another, producing guttural words and phrases as if gargling with mouthwash. I prefer slow conversations where words are counted like pearls, conversations with many pauses, pauses replacing words. I prefer my visitors elsewhere. She’s looking slightly above my chair. Her eyes, the color of quince jam, reinforce her easy demeanor, her loquacity.
“I need to rest,” I say. “The air feels humid.” Pause. “I might be getting a headache.”
Joumana’s eyes suddenly dart from one side to the other, gathering information at high speed. The crow’s feet around them tighten. I shut mine in despair. “Oh my Lord,” exclaims Joumana, “what is all this?” She twirls unhurriedly in place, looking up and down. Her face lights up and glows. “What have you been hiding in here?”
“It’s only books,” I say. “Only books.”
I imagine looking at the room through a stranger’s eyes. Books everywhere, stacks and stacks, shelves and bookcases, stacks atop each shelf, I in the creaky chair that hasn’t been reupholstered since I bought it in the early sixties. I have been its only occupant; years ago its foam molded into the shape of my posterior. The accompanying ottoman holds two stacks of books that haven’t been disturbed in years, except for semiweekly dusting. How many hours have I moved around this room, from nook to nook, making sure that everything is in its proper place, every book in its proper pile, every dust mote annihilated? An unframed circular mirror—when did I put that up and why had I kept it?—hangs by a nail on the door. I’d completely forgotten about it. Every surface in the room shines with dedicated cleanliness except for the mirror, of course. I’ve trained my eyes to avoid my reflection so admirably that I forgot it was there. Helen Garner is right. The vegetable-dyed Kazakh rug with noticeable rips was once a boisterous pomegranate, but the vacuum cleaner, after hundreds of passes, has sucked the fresh life out of it. I found the tortoiseshell floor lamp during the war, lonely and abandoned, outside a building that had just been looted—the pilferers had no use for a reading lamp. I spent an entire week restoring its luster. From one of its elegant metal loops, I hang a pair of reading glasses for easy access. The vase sits on seven books, liver-spotted paperbacks of the Muallaqat; each contains one of the poems with its annotations and essays. My favorite poems, four versions of them scattered, though not haphazardly, around the room.
The Suspended Odes, the Hanging Poems, seven poems from seven poets before Islam. The myth tells us that these poems were once written in gold on Coptic linen and hung on the drapes of the Kaaba in the sixth century. Erroneous, of course, since poems were memorized, rarely written, but a beautiful story nonetheless. I love the idea of a place of worship with hanging poetry, gilded no less.
In Joumana’s apartment upstairs, my reading room, this room, was her daughter’s bedroom. I know that because I heard her music through the years, her dancing with her boyfriend, her walking, her stomping, and, every so often, her yelling and door slamming. She’s now studying for a graduate degree in art or art history in France—quietly, one would hope. In Marie-Thérèse’s downstairs apartment, this was her son’s room, the no-longer-there boy. He was much quieter. I have no idea what Fadia uses hers for. I have never been in their rooms. Why do they feel it’s their right to be in mine?
A draft originating from the still-open front door, an unseemly breeze, brazenly ruffles the
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