“The Curse of the Chinar Tree” was produced as part of Paranda, a writer development program and global network for women writers in Afghanistan and the diaspora, facilitated by Untold Narratives and supported by KFW Stiftung. Often the writers choose to remain anonymous for their safety.
Shamsia
Translated from Dari by Abdul Bacet Khurram
What knocks a person to the ground or lifts them to the sky is not wealth, children, or fame. It’s something deep within us. Sometimes we are unaware of it, but other times we seek it in our quest for serenity. My father used to say that faith brings peace and elevates the soul. But for us, the color of peace was blood red, and its taste, a bitter torment.
I was standing next to the chinar tree of our house and gently brushing its starlike leaves. They were not as green as last year. I looked at my sister Maryam, “What’s more beautiful than a chinar tree in summer?” but she did not answer. Her eyes were fixed on the courtyard door. Father was standing at the entrance. The goats he had taken to graze were not with him. He was shaking and looked deathly pale. In his hand, he was holding a black stone the size of a sheep’s head. A strange stone that shone in the sunlight. I asked him if he was alright, but he said nothing. I approached him carefully and felt his face; it was cold. I fearfully called out for my mother. My father looked at me and said, his voice trembling, “Fatima, my daughter, he spoke to me…” I didn’t ask who spoke to him. When my mother saw my father’s condition, she quickly took him into the house. She tried to take the stone away from him but he wouldn’t let go. “I’m cold” he only kept on saying.
I covered him with a blanket as he leaned against the wall. He held the stone tightly in his arms and fell asleep. Maryam and our younger brother Yusof went to look for the flock. After three hours of waiting, my father woke up. The first thing he did was to get up, kiss the stone, and place it on the windowsill next to the Quran. My mother worriedly asked him, “What happened, Karim Khan? What is this stone?”
Father replied excitedly, “This morning when I was taking the animals to the hill, I saw this stone shining on the hilltop. I went near it and touched it when suddenly a bright light shot up from it into the sky. I heard a voice from heaven …” Tears welled up in his eyes. “I saw an angel with its wings stretching from east to west, covering the whole world. It came to me, took me in its embrace, and said, ‘God has chosen you out of all the righteous.’” We stared at him in astonishment. He quickly added, “I swear to God, this is what happened, I’m not crazy.” He took my hand and said, “Come, Fatima dear, touch this stone, feel its power, this stone is like Al-Hajar al-Aswad. It was sent down to me from heaven.” I touched the stone but felt nothing. My mother asked him to rest, and we both left the room.
Even though summer was fading away, the chinar leaves were only getting darker. As if they had forgotten what color into which they were meant to change. It was as though a sense of grief had washed over them. I didn’t tell anyone in the village about what happened, my mother wouldn’t let us talk about the stone or my father’s condition. The atmosphere in our house and my father’s condition were becoming dark like chinar leaves. My father wasn’t leaving the house anymore and was always sitting before that stone, whispering prayers. My mother didn’t know what to do, but at the same time, she couldn’t say anything against him.
One morning, I woke up to the sound of wind sending the leaves of the chinar tree swaying. I said my morning prayer and grabbed a bucket to milk the goats. The door to my father’s room was open, but he wasn’t inside. My eyes fell on the black stone. I felt as though someone had entered the stone, and was now mocking our hardship. I went to the stable and saw my father in blood-soaked clothes, slaughtering a goat. The blood flowed like a river, and I dropped the bucket from fear. My father saw me and said, “It’s good that you’re here, my daughter. Come, bring the bucket so I can put this meat in it.”
When my mother heard the bucket fall, she ran out of the house. Upon seeing my father she screamed, “What have you done!?”
“Don’t be afraid, woman, this is a sacrifice for God, the stone asked me last night to make a sacrifice for God, and this …”
“Didn’t you know that these goats are our sustenance?”
Father laughed out loud, “What are you talking about, woman, God has promised me better things than these, don’t worry.”
With a knot in her throat Mother said, “Promise of what, huh? Promise of what? You are neither a companion of God nor a messenger, what could God have seen in you to choose you, why are you listening to a stone that neither has a tongue nor speaks.”
Father’s tone became heated, “Be quiet, woman, what blasphemy are you uttering, don’t do anything that would drown us in God’s torment.”
Mother raised her voice, “We are already being tortured with you.” She threw the bucket at the dead animal and added, “sacrifice a few more so that we all die of hunger.” And with tears flowing from her eyes she went back into the house.
Father shouted, “Hurry up! Bring another bucket.”
The leaves of the chinar tree were falling to the ground one by one and it seemed as though it was no longer trying to survive. I wanted to see the fiery autumn leaves of the tree again, but its poor condition was getting worse by the day. Maryam said, “The reason it is drying up and the leaves are changing color is because the blood of the sacrifice has reached its roots.” I did not expect the tree to last until autumn. I didn’t know what would happen to us. We were all worried about the end. Among us, Yusof was the only one immersed in his childish world. He had no idea of the bitterness of life or our helplessness. I couldn’t talk to anyone about the stone and was afraid of what my father would do to me, but more than that I was afraid of what might happen to him. When my father was not in his room, Maryam and I would go there and read ayats from the Quran near the stone. Maryam believed that the devil had taken up residence in the stone, and that Ayat al Kursi had to be read near it every day. We even wrote it on a piece of paper and put it under the stone, but to no avail. As time went on, my thoughts about the stone and my father became darker and darker. I couldn’t sleep at night and felt as if someone was watching us from outside the window. We had nightmares every night. I felt like the entire house was cursed. I missed my father. I knew he was here with me, but he was not the same. I didn’t rely on him anymore and I didn’t imagine him standing behind me like a mountain. I felt that one day this mountain would devastate all its surroundings by destroying itself.
One day, while I was deep in thought, picking up the withered chinar leaves from the ground, I heard a voice. It was my mother standing in the doorway. “Have you done your ablution?”
Her question was unclear to me. I didn’t trust my ears and asked: “What?”
“I said, have you done ablution?”
I nodded.
“Come inside quickly, your father needs you.”
I took two or three dry leaves with me and put them in my book. I saw Maryam in the corridor. She also asked, “Have you done your ablution?” I nodded and she whispered in my ear, “Father has asked for us.”
She narrowed her eyes: “Do you know what he wants with us?” I didn’t say anything.
She hastily grabbed Yusof’s hand and pulled him with her, “We will go and perform ablution and come back.”
I entered my father’s room, and the first thing I noticed was the stone. My father was sitting in the corner. I stood at the door and greeted him. He asked me to come closer. I went and sat in front of him next to my mother. My father was right there in front of me, but I couldn’t see him. The way he spoke, the way he looked, the way he moved his hands, all had changed. I told myself he was not himself anymore. He remained silent for a few minutes but was constantly looking at the door. He regarded my mother and said, “Why aren’t Maryam and Yusof coming?” Mother had no answer and tried to make an excuse. With a shaking voice, I interrupted her, “They went to do Wudu, they will be back.”
“I know you have many questions in your mind, but today some of them will be answered,” he said.
It was raining outside and from time to time there was the sound of thunder. The weather was depressing, but more than depressed, I was feeling scared. Maryam and Yusof eventually came. Father picked up a prayer mat, faced the Qibla, and said, ‘“Everybody stand up and offer two rakats of prayer.’”
Yusof jumped up and happily stood next to father. We all got up, without question, and stood behind him to pray. I made a niyyah, prayed, and waited for my father’s next command. The stone was always in front of my eyes, even when I prayed I couldn’t take my eyes off it.
After saying dua, Father took the black stone from the windowsill, placed it in front of us facing the Qibla, and said: “The stone spoke to me in the name of God last night, saying ‘I will reveal myself to your children, to those whose faith in me is more than they show.’” Father looked at me and said, “Fatima, dear, do you have any doubts about your faith in God?”
I shook my head and he added, “Then today is the day you will find your answers. God has commanded us all to bow down before this stone. Ask it for help. And it is He who will soon reveal himself to us.”
Yusof quickly prostrated and Father smiled, “Well done, my son!”
He turned to me, Maryam, and Mother. We looked at each other. I could see the fear in my mother’s eyes. Trembling she squeezed my hand as though asking me to prostrate. I looked to my right. Maryam shaking her head intimated, no, don’t do it. I had no idea of what to do.
Father asked Maryam, “Why don’t you bow down?” Maryam remained silent. Father asked again in a calm tone, “Why don’t you prostrate, Maryam?”
She murmured in a quivering voice: “I don’t want to pray to this stone.”
My father, this time in a harsh tone, said, “How many times do I have to tell you that God is embedded in this stone, God is everywhere, He told me that …”
Maryam interrupted him and shouted, “If God is everywhere, then I prefer to pray in any other direction but not toward this stone.”
Father got up, and angrily pulled Maryam by her hair. She started crying and begging and tried to crawl away from him but father pulled her hair harder. He kept on shouting, “Prostrate … prostrate!”
My mother tried to stop him, but he slapped her and she fell to the ground. I didn’t know what to do; I was overcome with fear. Maryam’s screams and cries as father pressed her head to the ground had me shocked. I stood up, and with all the strength that I could muster, pushed my father before taking the Quran in my arms. In a voice filled with emotion I hopelessly cried out, “If you do not fear us, fear God.”
My father wanted to slap me as well but changed his mind at the last moment. Cursing he told us to leave the room. I picked up Maryam, who was unable to walk and left the room with my mother and Yusof. As I closed the door behind me, I took one last look at my father. He was kneeling in front of the stone, crying and begging for its help. I no longer had any hopes for his recovery. Maryam could not fully sleep after that incident; whenever she did fall asleep she would jump up screaming and crying after a few hours. My mother was also terrified and was sleeping by the door at night. During the day, all of her attention was on my father. Our life had changed completely, there wasn’t even a glimmer of peace in it anymore. I didn’t know who cursed our calm.
Autumn had come. My chinar tree had no leaves left and no orange color, its branches were bent and had turned black as night. I asked my mother what was happening to the tree, and she said, “It’s nothing, autumn is here …” but I wondered why it wasn’t like this the previous years. After a very long time, my father finally came out of his room. He was dressed in white clothes and had a black shawl over his shoulders. He came towards me.
“What a beautiful day, my daughter.”
I greeted him.
My father said, “Can you clean my boots, my dear I want to go to the village market.”
I felt like my father had returned to his old self. I quickly jumped up, cleaned his boots, and polished them with a brush. I was looking at him playing with Yusof, just like before. He went over to Maryam and kissed her. He was trying to make my mother laugh; he was happy. I thought I was living a dream. He looked completely changed. He put on his boots and thanked me by running his hand over my head.
I asked my father about the chinar tree. He looked at it for a long time and said, “You know, this tree is the same age as you, almost 21 years old, but how strange that it has withered so quickly.” He paused for a moment, touched its bark, and added, “When I return from the market I will cut it to the ground. I don’t think it will grow green again.”
I don’t know why I didn’t feel sad for the tree, it was as though seeing my father had made me forget all of my problems and sorrows. He was better now. He asked my mother if she needed anything from the market and left the house with Yusof. I went to my father’s room and looked in, the stone was covered with a white cloth. I felt that my father was finally done with that strange stone. Had we woken up from a nightmare? My mother and I went to his room to clean it. I couldn’t remember how many days it had been since anyone went in there, dust had covered everything. I drew the curtains and started cleaning the windowsill while my mother swept the room. After a few minutes, she put down the straw broom and leaned against the wall as though fatiqued.
“Are you tired? Would you like me to sweep and you dust?” I inquired.
She shook her head and said, “No, no, I’m not tired, I was just thinking, that’s all.”
“Thinking about what?” I asked.
“I never understood why your father became like this all of a sudden. He never engaged in haram, never missed a single rakat of his prayer. I’ve never seen him like this before. I don’t know who cast an evil eye on us. I never thought he would raise his hand against me or his children …” her hand went to her face trying to hold back the tears. I went and tried to console her. She wiped her tears and said with a smile, “Inshallah, it’s all behind us now.”
I smiled at her reassurance and went back to my work.
“Have you ever thought that maybe your Father was telling the truth?”
I asked, “About what?”
She shrugged her shoulders and said: “About the stone …”
“I don’t know, maybe it was just his imagination, I hope father will throw the stone away so that we can be rid of it. Why would God want to talk to father?”
My mother said “You’re right, my daughter. It was a disaster but we got through it by the grace of God.”
She started sweeping again, “I remember your grandfather, may God rest his soul, used to say that God tests his servants in two ways. In the first way, he tests them with what they have like wealth and children, and by that, he sees their piety. In the second way, God tests the faith of his servants by sending torments on their way. Your grandfather always prayed to God to spare us from the latter because he believed that faith is a very shaky and fragile thing. I think we’ve just been through very hard torment, don’t you think?”
This sentence made me think, and I said to myself, if this was a torment, how soon did it pass, and if this was a test, are we now among the righteous? It was difficult for me to make sense of it. I turned to my mother and wanted to ask her about it when my eyes caught the sight of a motionless body standing at the door. It was my father, his white clothes stained with blood, his knees dirty, and in his hands, a knife. He wasn’t moving. I said in a trembling voice, “Father …”
My mother also noticed him and froze. She didn’t know what to say or do. The first words on her lips were, “Where’s Yusof?” but Father remained silent. When I remembered that Yusof had been with him, I was overcome with fear. My mother took a few steps forward. “Whose blood is this, Karim?”
My father was smiling. He looked down at his hands and dropped the dagger to the floor. Then he said softly, “I saw… I …” sometimes looking at the ceiling, and sometimes all around him. He wouldn’t finish his sentence. Maryam appeared behind him and watched in horror, my mother screamed “Tell me! Where is Yusof?”
I looked at Maryam and fearfully asked her to go look for Yusof. My mind was going through the same scenario as my mother’s, but I prayed that I was wrong, wishing it was just a nightmare. I went to the window and started counting the goats but each time, the number had not decrease. I returned to Father and demanded in a firm voice, “Tell us, Father, where is Yusof?”
Father said in a unsteady voice “Yusof …” he kept on repeating: “Yusof …” but then fell silent. He looked back. My mother fell to his feet and shouted, “Tell me, what did you do to him?”
He whispered something under his breath, looked to the stone, and said: “Stone … said … on the hill …”
His speech was broken, and I couldn’t understand what he was saying. Furious, I picked up the stone and held it in the air. I was about to smash it to the ground when Father suddenly cried “Don’t, don’t … it’s God’s punishment …”
I was filled with rage. I no longer cared who he was or what he would do. I threw the stone down hard on the floor, its broken pieces scattered. In a quick motion Father slapped me across the face so hard that it knocked me down, but I felt no pain. I gathered myself and got up. My mother was still on the floor, crying. My father was on his knees, muttering,“God, forgive me, God, forgive me…”
I shouted “The God you worship is not the real God.”
Father turned to me, and this time I could see the anger in his eyes. His gaze was filled with red. The veins in his head were bulging. He was clenching his teeth and panting like a monster. I began to shake and felt that death was lurking nearby. He put his hands on my throat and started to squeeze. I couldn’t move. I punched and kicked, but his body and hands were so strong that the pressure on my throat didn’t seem to ease.
Everything went dark. I couldn’t breathe anymore. I only kept saying quietly, “Father”… Just as I was about to pass out, I suddenly felt the pressure easing and I could breathe once again. I slowly opened my eyes and saw my father staring at his hands. His expression was strange, as though the hands were not his own. He was whispering, “What am I doing?” as I followed my father’s confused expression, drops of blood splashed into my eyes. I didn’t know where they came from but I was sure it was blood. When I next opened my eyes, I saw my mother screaming, stabbing my Father in his side. She stabbed him a few times before he fell to the floor. She went over to him and stabbed him several more times in the chest. My father stopped breathing. He was dead.
Blood was everywhere. My mother took me in her embrace, but I kept staring at my father, his still wide-open eyes, his face with that same, dry smile. It was as though he had achieved what he wanted, but he wasn’t alive anymore. Yes, he was no longer alive. My mother asked how I was, but I couldn’t answer. Shaking and breathing heavily she hugged me again.
Suddenly we heard the sound of the courtyard door opening. People had entered the house. Their voices came closer. Maryam was talking to someone. It was Yusof. We both fell deathly silent, our eyes locked and it felt as though our spirits had left our bodies. Our hair rose on end, and breathing became difficult. Someone speaking approached the room. Yusof said, “Mother, look, father and I found a sheep on the hill, and we …” He reached the door, and when he saw us and all of that blood, the poor boy became rooted to the spot with fear. He turned pale as snow. The shawl he was holding fell from his hands, and several pieces of raw meat spilled out onto the ground. I didn’t know what had happened. I just kept looking frantically in every direction, wishing I could just wake up from this nightmare to hug my father again. But it was too late and this wasn’t a nightmare. Perhaps the torment that grandfather had warned us about arrived. I hadn’t seen heaven and couldn’t imagine it except as a childish dream, but now I knew hell. I knew where it was, and what it was like. I knew its people and I knew their sins. Hell … hell is within these walls we call home and I am forever stuck there.
