The desert tales

I was very moved by a concert I saw recently by Tinariwen- a band of Tuareg-Berber musicians from the Sahara Desert region of northern Mali. 

It reminded me of the few encounters I had with people from the Sahara when I was in Morocco. I remember their piercing cunning eyes which were clear and full of both sorrow and humour, in an equal measure, their movements flowing and gentle, yet doing every action in an optimum precise way. These people had a presence which has left me till this day dreaming about the Sahara.

It reminded me of my own brief 2 day trip to the desert in the western part of India- Rajastan.

It was probably the most magical, fairy-tale experience I've ever had. My camel was a bit older so I stayed behind the rest of the group, really making me feel it was just me and her, the sand and the sun. Being in awe of the never-changing landscape as far as the eye can see, respecting the scrubs, every little insect and the miracle of life- growing out of the most inhospitable ground. Falling under the spell of the gentle sound of bells when a herd of goats or sheep were passing by, the tune of the shepard whistling along. You're in another world. A simple, natural, enchanting world you don't want to leave. Life is hard in the desert. I guess we are all living in it in a way. Trying hard to survive and at the same time trying to live without effort and to remember life's magical tune.

Terry Pratchett wrote, “Night poured over the desert. It came suddenly, in purple. In the clear air, the stars drilled out of the sky, reminding any thoughtful watcher that it is in the deserts and high places that religions are generated. When men see nothing but bottomless infinity over their heads the have always had a driving and desperate urge to find someone to put in the way.” 

Yet there is another way the soul of the desert emerges, it is through music and through stories..

Here's two wonderful desert stories I found online.

"Friends in the desert" 

(author unknown)

Two friends were walking through the desert. During some point of the journey, they had an argument and one friend slapped the other one in the face. The one who got slapped was hurt, but without saying anything, wrote in the sand:

"Today my best friend slapped me in the face."

They kept on walking, until they found an oasis, where they decided to take a bath. The one who had been slapped got stuck in the mire and started drowning, but the friend saved him. After he recovered from the near drowning, he wrote on a stone:

"Today my best friend saved my life."

The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked him, "After I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write on a stone, why?"

The friend replied, when someone hurts us we should write it down in sand, where the winds of forgiveness can erase it away. But, when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it."

The Tale of the Sands - A Spiritual Sufi Story

By Awad Afifi

A stream, from its source in far-off mountains, passing through every kind and description of countryside, at last reached the sands of the desert. Just as it had crossed every other barrier, the stream tried to cross this one, but it found that as fast as it ran into the sand, its waters disappeared.

It was convinced, however, that its destiny was to cross this desert, and yet there was no way. Now a hidden voice, coming from the desert itself, whispered: "The Wind crosses the desert, and so can the stream."

The stream objected that it was dashing itself against the sand, and only getting absorbed: that the wind could fly, and this was why it could cross a desert.

"By hurtling in your own accustomed way you cannot get across. You will either disappear or become a marsh. You must allow the wind to carry you over, to your destination."

"But how could this happen?"

"By allowing yourself to be absorbed in the wind."

This idea was not acceptable to the stream. After all, it had never been absorbed before. It did not want to lose its individuality. And, once having lost it, how was one to know that it could ever be regained?

"The wind," said the sand, "performs this function. It takes up water, carries it over the desert, and then lets it fall again. Falling as rain, the water again becomes a river."

"How can I know that this is true?"

"It is so, and if you do not believe it, you cannot become more than a quagmire, and even that could take many, many years; and it certainly is not the same as a stream."

"But can I not remain the same stream that I am today?"

"You cannot in either case remain so," the whisper said. "Your essential part is carried away and forms a stream again. You are called what you are even today because you do not know which part of you is the essential one."

“The desert and the ocean are realms of desolation on the surface. 

The desert is a place of bones, where the innards are turned out, to desiccate into dust. 

The ocean is a place of skin, rich outer membranes hiding thick juicy insides, laden with the soup of being. 

Inside out and outside in. These are worlds of things that implode or explode, and the only catalyst that determines the direction of eco-movement is the balance of water. 

Both worlds are deceptive, dangerous. Both, seething with hidden life. 

The only veil that stands between perception of what is underneath the desolate surface is your courage. 

Dare to breach the surface and sink.” 

― Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

“Paradise is not a garden of bliss and changeless perfection where the lions lie down like lambs (what would they eat?) and the angels and cherubim and seraphim rotate in endless idiotic circles, like clockwork, about an equally inane and ludicrous -- however roseate -- unmoved mover. That particular painted fantasy of a realm beyond time and space which Aristotle and the church fathers tried to palm off on us has met, in modern times, only neglect and indifference passing on into oblivion it so richly deserved, while the paradise of which I write and wish to praise is with us yet, the the here and now, the actual, tangible, dogmatically real earth on which we stand.” 

― Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire

“most of my wandering in the desert i've done alone. not so much from choice as from necessity - i generally prefer to go into places where no one else wants to go. i find that in contemplating the natural world my pleasure is greater if there are not too many others contemplating it with me, at the same time.” 

― Edward Abbey, Desert Solitaire

Ozymandias- Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown

And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.

And on the pedestal these words appear:

`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,

The lone and level sands stretch far away".