Hassan: The Story of Hassan of Baghdad and How He Came to Make the Golden Journey to Samarkand Part 27

ISHAK Ha.s.san--where doth he lie? Ha.s.san, O Ha.s.san.

Thou hast broken that gentle heart, Haroun, and I have broken my lute: I play no more for thee. Ah, why did they not tell me sooner-- I fear his reason may have fled before I find him: he may be wandering in the streets to-night like Death, and tearing at his eyes. Ha.s.san, oh, Ha.s.san!

It is he: he lies just as I first saw him: beneath a fountain, face toward the moon. His life is rhyming like a song: it harks back to the old refrain. Is life a mirror wherein events show double?

Ha.s.sAN (Half waking from his swoon) Swans that drift into the mist....

ISHAK (Bending over him to raise him) Friend, I am glad to hear thy voice.

Rise, rise, thou art in a pitiable case.

Ha.s.sAN (Faintly) Let me lie....This place is quiet, and the earth smells cool.

May I never rise till they lift me aboard my coffin, and I'll go a sailing down the river and out to sea.

ISHAK You are alive--no one will hurt you: you hold to your reason and fight despair.

Ha.s.sAN And in that sea are no red fish....

ISHAK Come: rise: be brave: I know you have suffered.

Ha.s.sAN She was brave. Ah, her hands, her hands!

ISHAK Do not tell me that tale.

Ha.s.sAN You are a poet. They cut off her lover's head and poured blood upon her eyes!

ISHAK Be silent. You are full of devils. I tell you, it is not true.

Stop dreaming: look into my eyes: listen!

(Bells are heard without the garden.)

You hear? The camels are being driven to the Gate of the Moon.

At midnight starts the great summer caravan for the cities of the Far North East, divine Bokhara and happy Samarkand.

It is a desert path as yellow as the bright sea-sh.o.r.e: therefore the Pilgrims call it The Golden Journey.

Ha.s.sAN And what of that to you or me, your Golden Journey to Samarkand?

ISHAK I am leaving this city of slaves, this Bagdad of fornication.

I have broken my lute and will write no more qasidahs in praise of the generosity of kings. I will try the barren road, and listen for the voice of the emptiness of earth. And you shall walk beside me.

Ha.s.sAN I?

ISHAK Rise, and confide to me once more the direction of your way.

Ha.s.sAN (Rising with ISHAK's aid) Why save me from a death desired?

What am I to you or to any man living? Why would you force me like a fate to live?

ISHAK Because I am your friend, and need you.

Ha.s.sAN Oh, Ishak, singer of songs!

ISHAK Prepare for travel.

Ha.s.sAN I have no possessions.

ISHAK O pilgrim! O true pilgrim! I have dinars of gold: we will furnish ourselves at the gate, and change these silks of indolence for the camel-hair of toil.

But have you not one thing in your house to take-- no one single thing?

Ha.s.sAN (With a great shudder) Within that door--nothing.

But I have one old carpet that still lies in my shop.

Its gentle flowers the negro has not defiled.

And yet I dare not seek it.

ISHAK I will bring it you. You shall stretch it out upon the desert when you say your evening prayer, and it will be a little meadow in the waste of sand.

Ha.s.sAN (Seizing ISHAK on a sudden panic) Keep close to me: do not leave me!

The night is growing wild!

ISHAK Hold to your reason! It is all stars and moon and crystal peace.

Ha.s.sAN The trees are moving without a wind...the flowers are talking...

the stars are growing bigger....

ISHAK Be calm, there is nothing.

(The fountain runs red.)

Ha.s.sAN The fountain--the fountain!

ISHAK Oh! alas! it is pouring blood! Come away.

Ha.s.sAN The Garden is alive!

ISHAK Come away: it is haunted! Come away: come away! Follow the bells!

(Exeunt in terror.)

(The GHOST of the Artist of the Fountain rises from the fountain itself in pale Byzantine robes.)

FOUNTAIN GHOST The garden to the ghosts. Come forth, new brother and new sister.

Come forth while enough of earth's heavy influence remains upon you-- to speak and to be seen. Come forth, and those who are past shall dance with those who are to come.

GHOST OF RAFI (With the voice of RAFI, the clothes of RAFI, the broken fetters of RAFI, but pale...as death) We are here, O Shadow of the Fountain.

FOUNTAIN GHOST Welcome, thou and thy white lady to these...haunts.

Wander at will. I have scared away the sons of flesh.

GHOST OF RAFI How were they scared, those two?