The Laboratory of Love, page 21
“Semen’s the only moisturizer that really works,” the belly dancer remarks idly to her bullfight date, lifting his hand from her thigh, inspecting her face in a compact mirror. “It’s the protein or something.” In the ring, Curro Romero illustrates just how far he is past his prime. Each year his costumes become flashier, his moves with the cape less elegant. Reyna remains in her shaded seat while the rest of the corrida audience rises to turn its back against Romero’s bungling of another bull. The belly dancer blows the matador a kiss. He bows low before her, then tosses her an unearned ear that causes the crowd to roar louder disapproval. Afterward, Reyna’s wealthy American date mistakenly believes he’s purchased something beside seafood and wine for five thousand pesetas. “I’m going to make myself beautiful,” she evades, heading toward the restaurant’s Señoras to slip out a rear exit. “My kisses aren’t for sale,” she proclaims back home, undulating anxiously before my eyes. “Feel this,” she says, placing my hand on her belly. Something inside hits my palm; a secret child bangs the wall of imprisoning flesh. Long ago, Reyna brutally rid herself of who she used to be. She left a fetus with her face in miniature floating by the foggy shores of San Francisco and a decade later was reborn as an exotic dancer who crowned herself Queen of Anything At All. (In illegal clinics in this country, embryos aren’t wasted; they become the chief ingredient of expensive oils, lotions, creams.) I too have shed former selves as easily as snakes squirm from skin, freeing myself to coil around cacti, beneath flat stones. Reyna, we could spin from this city on the early morning bus, cross the Strait of Gibraltar beneath birds and breeze, be back on the desert before shadow has stretched into darkness on the sand. When were we last there? In what lifetime long ago? It becomes more difficult to remember with every night we dance for sad fugitives of some Foreign Legion of the heart. In a week you will leave here for your tenement across the sea, and we will not reunite to share a sixth Sevilla spring. It’s clear that one of us doesn’t make the other stronger. Our journeys back to where we started must be undertaken separately or not at all. Perhaps it’s already too late to return. Perhaps we have forgotten how to exist on dried entrails of armadillo.
“If I get another, we can make a Mickey Mouse hat,” suggests the belly dancer, jaunty once more, holding up her trophy. Blood from the ear has dried brown on her skirt. Reyna dabs at the stain while the unanswered telephone is forced to ring by one of the weak men who wish her or me to sway the hot, still night. Already the severed ear has begun to fill the room with pungent scent; we’ll need no further incense this evening. On the other side of the city, Curro Romero practices imperfect pirouettes before an accusing mirror. He stumbles, shrugs, reaches for the bottle. He accepts that the game is over. (His hotel room is otherwise empty; there is no one to remind him that alcohol as well as salt will bloat.) I paint the belly dancer’s fingernails—one red, the next black. She is twenty-five or forty-five or somewhere in between; anyway, the end of her career is also near. The night will be shockingly cold, though the day was much too hot: you’re never prepared for the desert’s swift, extreme changes of temperature, no matter how many of them you survive. Like bullfighters, belly dancers don’t usually have bank accounts, social security numbers, or pension plans to soothe the future; it’s difficult to save for a rainy day when you have been raised to believe that no precipitation would ever fall upon a sere landscape around you. I blow on Reyna’s long, thin hands until I’m breathlessly unable to call out the name of the lover who left no footprints in the shifting sand. San Juan sin ti, grieves Luis Enrique one more time, exiled always from his island. In the Andalucian air beyond the window, flutters and wails of Moorish music evoke camel caravans and somber Saharan sunsets and bands of thirsty Bedouins. “Please don’t ask me anything about love,” repeats the belly dancer, before we retire to our separate pillows. We lie awake in the narcotic night and hope for a breath of breeze to stir the air, caress our crumbling skin, touch our kohl-blinded eyes with one more kiss we cannot see.
The Tattoo Artist
It was not easy to find the tattoo artist, though his skill was renowned throughout our town and far beyond. Away from the boulevards and cafés, away from lights and crowds, he lived among the narrow, twisting alleys behind the quartier portugais. These were lit only by weak lamps attached sparingly to the cold stone walls, and rats roamed freely after dark within the gutters and the waste. Few people passed over the rough cobblestones then; occupants were silent, if not sleeping behind closed doors to either side; the doors were unnumbered as the alleys were not named. Except for a cat’s sudden scream, or the squeak of a bat, no sounds but the footsteps and heartbeat of a solitary searcher would echo against stone. It was possible to find the tattoo artist only on a starless night, when he did not prick coloured constellations into the black skin of the sky.
A sign did not hang helpfully upon the artist’s door; nor did the door stand open in invitation. Within the labyrinth, the tattoo artist’s whereabouts were as elusively unfixed as those of a fugitive, though it was purported that his room was always a bare, cement space illuminated by one candle, half-burned, whose light transformed his ancient dyes and needles into substances sheened with gold. If you were able to discover the secret way to the tattoo artist, the path of your life would be changed forever, it was averred in the tone of absolute certainty only ignorance can evoke: nothing and everything was known about this man whom the mute would describe in clear, precise detail if they could speak. Perhaps he strolled through the souk, unidentified though not disguised, to hear the stories told about him—all contradictory, all unproven—when we wearied of discussing the sixty lessons of the Koran or the reason for changing tides.
Each of us grew up with a mother’s warning that, if we were not careful, the tattoo artist would etch hideous, permanent pictures into our sleeping skin. Later we learned that perhaps his designs could attract the ideal lover who does not waver, who never strays. Some said the artist substituted poison for ink when sought out by an evil man, and some suggested that in certain worthy cases his handiwork could cure sickness and even extend life. There were those, too, who claimed that his instruments were the tools of Allah, and his images the Prophet’s revelation. It was agreed that one needed to seek the tattoo artist at the correct time of life: overly tender skin would fester, blister, and scar beneath his needles, while tough and weathered flesh would break them. The tattoo artist was a Jew from Essaouira, a marabout from Tarfaya, a Berber murderer or thief. Perhaps he was a distant cousin on your mother’s side, the leper disintegrating in front of the Cinéma Le Paris, that pilgrim glimpsed yesterday on the road to Azemmour. Stories shifted like Sahara sand blowing through the derbs, and they changed shape and form from one day to the next, according to the wind’s whims. I did not puzzle at never seeing an example of the tattoo artist’s work during my yearning youth: by the time I grew into a man, I had come to believe his design would remain invisible upon a subject until that being stretched his soul into a canvas tight and strong and broad enough to display the beauty that it held.
On the starless night I finally felt compelled to find the tattoo artist, I had to ask infrequent strangers hurrying through the alleys for directions. Often they wouldn’t pause to answer or muttered brusquely that they didn’t know; many spoke a dialect I hadn’t heard and could not understand, as if they came from the other side of the Atlas Mountains, or far beyond the Rif. If I knocked on a door to ask my way, those inside remained silent or warned me off with a shout. I remembered how it was said that numerous people had vanished in the course of the search I was undertaking. Whenever a restless, dissatisfied soul disappeared from our town, the assumption would be that he had passed through the gates of the quartier portugais and had failed to emerge. Some said these narrow alleys, dark even during day, teemed with lost spirits who on each starless night reached out with hungry bones of fingers for anyone foolish enough to seek the tattoo artist they had not found. This was home, it was rumoured, to countless beings fallen into disappointment and despair, and that they sought consolation in narcotic and carnal pleasures was evidenced in the sweet smoke and moans rising into the blue sky above our sensible town. “See what happens,” mothers told their discontented children, hoping one day these offspring would grow satisfied with the prospect of a harmless tattoo of the kind offered every day at a reasonable price in the market; for example, a green cross of Islam, or a yellow star of hope.
I wandered until north and south became indistinct and time and distance lost proportion, before finding someone who would help. She looked at me with suspicious eyes under the lamp where we met and appeared undecided whether to speak or not. Slowly a knowing smile twisted her face, which was scarred and disfigured beneath heavy powder. “The next crossing,” she said finally, placing ironic emphasis on each word. “The third door to the left.” She turned and walked swiftly away, drawing a scarf more closely around her head, leaving behind light, mocking laughter.
The tattoo artist did not answer my knock; but when I pushed the door, it opened. In a room off the entrance, he sat on a wooden bench between the small table holding his instruments and colours and the chair in which his clients sat when they were not required to lay on the floor or stand erect to receive his mark. He looked in my direction as I entered but did not rise to greet me. The old man wore a dark robe, with a hood concealing his hair—whether black or white or vanished—and partly curtaining his eyes. The garment made it difficult to determine his body’s size or shape. His fingers were long and thin and naked of rings. No tattoos could be seen on the skin uncovered by the robe. Appearing absorbed in thought, scarcely conscious of my presence, the tattoo artist did not speak.
I sat in the chair and explained I wanted a tattoo unlike any other in the world. Commonplace tattoos—a lover’s name or initials; an eagle, lion or snake—did not interest me, less the heart, the arrow, the bolt of lightning; nor did I wish for some rare symbol of obscure significance. I wanted a singular tattoo that would reveal my unique essence. If I couldn’t describe it, or refer to it by name, this was because my desired design existed only in the tattoo artist’s imagination as yet. With absolute certainty, I knew that the mark should be imprinted upon my heart.
The tattoo artist listened, then left the room by a door to the rear. He returned and set a tray holding a silver teapot and three glasses on the floor. After a moment, he poured pale tea into two of the glasses. Steam began to rise. Suddenly I wanted to tell the tattoo artist many things about myself: where I had come from, what I had seen and done, whom I had loved. I needed him to know how long I had anticipated this moment, and how difficult it had been to find him, and that any doubt I had felt about receiving his mark was gone. He should hear me and see me, I believed, in order to know exactly what to place on my skin; but the artist only watched the rising steam with seeming disinterest in the material before him, and I could not interrupt his silence. He shifted the candle slightly, then studied the shadow it cast on the wall. He sighed. Removing a small square of folded paper from his robe, he opened it above one glass and spilled white powder into the tea. He handed me the glass. I drank the hot liquid quickly, then loosened my shirt and lay on my back. The cement below me warmed as I fell asleep.
It was cold when I awoke. The candle still burned halfway down. The tray that held the teapot still rested on the floor. One glass was empty, one glass was full, the third was gone. There was a burning sensation at my heart. I bent my neck and saw my tattoo. At once I knew I had never seen such a shape before. It was unique. I didn’t know the significance of the symbol; it called nothing definite to my mind, yet seemed at once to suit me and to describe me. Was there a suggestion of a cresting wave, the hint of a half-closed eye, an allusion to an outstretched wing? Refastening my shirt, I watched the tattoo artist wipe his needles of dye with a wet cloth. He replaced them exactly in their former position on the table. He stared at his instruments with an expression that contained amazement or horror or pleasure, or a mixture of those three emotions. He appeared unable to hear my thanks or my offer of payment. I left his room.
For several years, I was pleased with my tattoo, though the pricked skin continued to burn long after it healed, in a way that wouldn’t allow me to forget its presence. When exposed, it caused astonishment and envy, and those with apparently ordinary tattoos sought my companionship and approval. My mark became famous in the town and occupied a central place in conversation. On the corners, old men argued endlessly over its meaning, and small children tried to trace its outline with sticks in the shore’s sand. Seers used the shape to predict the future. Holy men proclaimed it evidence of Allah’s touch. In the dark, lovers pressed lips against the brilliant colour; tried to lick off the resistant ink, travelled its complex contours with their tongues. It became fashionable, for one season, for other young men to have my design copied onto their skin by the tattoo artists in the market. Such imitations, however skilled, proved inexact and appeared grotesque. During this time, I felt that even with my shirt buttoned to my neck, passersby could see through the fabric and spy the colours stained upon my heart.
Later, though unchanged, my tattoo seemed to evoke a different response—distrust or pity or fear. People fell silent as I approached down the street, and hands were placed over children’s eyes. No longer did lovers line up to lie with me on the sand; perhaps they realized their kisses would not erase my mark, that it must always fail to slake their thirst, that it could never be swallowed to ease an aching hunger. Now I was lonely and separated from others by what I once hoped would permit them to see me clearly and to know me intimately. As if it were obscene, I tried to keep my tattoo hidden by wearing a heavy burnoose during the hottest season. “I hope you got what you wanted,” said my mother, as another wedding procession wound past our door. Now ashamed of my mark, I wished it would fade or wash away, or alter into an unremarkable design. At night, dreams of an unbranded existence afforded me brief release; waking at morning brought bitter disappointment. When I offered the tattoo artists in the market large sums to remove my mark, their refusals were nervous but adamant, and I was driven to prowl the dark alleys behind the quartier portugais once more. Hoping its creator could alter or eliminate my unwanted design, I searched for him on many starless nights, yet in those narrow passages encountered only youths with blank, unmarked skin. “Go home,” I told them. “Before it’s too late.”
My tattoo seared more sharply one day, as if freshly pricked onto my skin. The pain would not permit me to sleep or dream or pray. At this time, I began to wonder about the tattoo artist, seeking to reconstruct every detail of my experience with him, and to find in memory a clue to the meaning of my mark, or a way of living with it. I mused upon the possible landscape of the artist’s past and the likely geography of his present. What were his intentions when the canvas of my skin had faced him? Why had he used his dyes and needles on me in one way and not another? This was the period when I hoped to understand the implications of my mark by comprehending the artist who placed it there, as we turn our eyes toward the heavens to contemplate the creator who fashions us here below.
In this way, my long journey began. I roamed first our town and then nearby ones in search of somebody with the same tattoo as mine. I had faith that at least one other man wore the brilliant shape that hovered over my heart; even accidentally, it must have been drawn more than once. It had to have a twin. As years went by, and my search met no success, I journeyed farther and farther, crossing mountains and valleys, deserts and plains, rivers and oceans and streams. In distant lands, I saw many things and met many people, but the man whose tattoo exactly mirrored mine did not materialize before my eyes. When it finally occurred, I still believed, our meeting would possess the symmetry and grace of a balanced equation: my mark vanishes beneath his gaze as his dissolves under mine, and we no longer each feel the same constant pain. “One glass was empty, one glass was full, the third was gone,” I repeated as the road stretched far before me.
Although my end is growing near, I continue to roam from place to place in hope of discovering someone marked like me. The skin above my heart still burns; I haven’t grown used to the ache. While some colours of the world have surely faded, and stars have dimmed like faith, my tattoo flames as brightly as ever. Now it is many years since I have been to the town of my birth, and I don’t know if my family and friends still live. I don’t know if the tattoo artist still practices his esoteric art within the dark alleys behind the quartier portugais. I don’t know if he still pricks needles into flesh, staining it differently each time, leaving upon our hearts the unique designs from which we seek release.
Hieroglyphics I : Only the Bird Knows the Wing
His touch upon my shoulder wakens me.
Finding the room empty except for myself, I innocently believe the slam of a neighbour’s door has disturbed my dreams. On this virgin visit I am unequipped to understand how, in the instant it takes my eyes to open, he is able to steal away unwitnessed, his escape betrayed not even by a discreet closing of the door that leads to the courtyard common to each piso of the building or of the farther one that issues upon the street beyond. My senses have not learned to detect a blur of his warmth, just the slightest smudge of scent, lingering in chill air whose darkness is relieved only by the candle that always sits on the desk beside my pallet and that invariably illuminates my labour in the notebook there. Let it burn, urges my drowsy mind, not attempting to explain the resurrection of a flame surely extinguished before sleep, trying instead to determine the time by means of aural evidence. Heels do not tap over cobblestones in the street outside; the bar directly across its narrow width is silent; voices fail to float from San Eloy twenty farther steps away. I have been roused at night’s deepest hour when, on the other side of this room’s wall, in their ascetic beds, nuns clutch rosaries in unconscious, callous hands. When only whores and maricones of the barrio witness my vanished visitor slip through its twisting streets, perhaps to interrupt the dreams of any number of other souls before dawn.
