Dark Hole
Where do these soulless lives go?
Dot. Dot. Dot. Dot. Dot. Dot. 0. A round formation. A small minuscule rising. It was appearing. Flickering. Growing by each second. Breathing a little life of its own. Hardly there. But there alright. There all the the same. Too small to be of any notice. Zero state. We wouldn’t even be able to celebrate its birthday if we wanted to track. It was such a small thing.
Everything began somewhere. Began somewhere. Almost out of nothing. But probably out of something. I am not sure what, though. There are these reasons. Practical, tangible, scientific reasons for why everything came into place. Some say it was the miracle of creation. Some say the Big Bang. To me, everything seems simply magical. And tragic.
‘Miss, what becomes of a white hole when it enters a black hole?’
My sister told me there are people in the world who were not born with souls. ‘And we have stamped their hearts with darkness,’ I wanted to ask, are those people like black holes?
Was it really then a black hole that struck me? 25 November, 2016. Did God send his soulless agent to a fifteen-year-old, a black hole collides a white hole…
‘Miss, what do you think will happen?”
I don’t quite know.
‘The white hole persists,’ I say absent-mindedly, tucking my long hair behind my ear.
It must do.
The young boy goes back to painting. A journey into space. Space, the vast oblivion that everyone talks about.
Dot by dot it grows. Every little thing on this planet. How come is it then there are people in the world with no souls?
As cells combine with each other, populate, and propagate, they are large enough to have a form. A form comes inside of you.
How little do we know of each other’s bodies? How is it that we can go so long without knowing what grows inside us?
I wanted to track where it all began. The beginning of Earth, everything evil, everything holy. I found myself in any and every place.
‘And we have stamped their hearts with darkness.’
I couldn’t help but worry about that. Was I one of those people, too?
My heart remained unmoved in the holiest places of all. Blinded perhaps by grief, anger, and misery. I didn’t want to repent about anything. I didn’t have an ask.
Something grows on top inside your two lumps. Something that finally makes itself known. Every life out there means something. It has some purpose. But what about this unnatural propagation of cells? This unruly existence.
Pigeons flew around us. Friendly, beady-eyed, black, grey, blue, white. Their eyes were a strange violet color. They always seem too odd to me. They seemed to know something I didn’t. And here, here, everyone knew something I didn’t. They knew God. They were witnessing miracles on a daily in the holiest place of all. I didn’t care, though. I was still angry, angsty, wanting nothing more to know, and yet hoping I never had to see any of it at all. I was floating in a timeless space for so long.
‘Allah, Allah, Allah, just like this, even in your sleep, repeat his name so many times, the prayer on your mouth becomes the prayer in your heart. This is like music too, Uswa.’
I found myself lost again. It was past twelve, and I didn’t know where I was again in this new city where everyone dressed the same. No one was looking at me. I could run amok. It didn’t matter where I came from or where I was going. Everyone was in the pursuit of God, wanting to find him before their time runs out, wanting to catch him like lightning in a bottle, as if God will expire as does their visa. But they will take this miracle with them. Their thirst will be satiated. Their pursuit will end. It was only now that they had to look, to take in everything around, remember the miracle.
But I was lost.
I am a weed. I have come out somewhere I wasn’t meant to. I have been here long enough not to feel so strange. Why am I still so out of place? Where did I come from? Why do I continue to grow still?
The being has now poked its head out. Found some kind of consciousness of its own.
Where do these soulless lives go?
‘I remember falling in love with the little girl who had God in her heart. One who only felt peace when she bowed her head in front of God. Now, she’s a vengeful bitch who wasted away her youth on scorn.’
Angry, I was so angry. I walked back home in anger each time. If I wasn’t angry, I was slightly dazed. I wanted to be filled with grace, too. I wanted to know forgiveness. But I couldn’t even tell if any of that was for me. I was consumed by a black hole.
The form has now grown so large. It is visible on her bosom. It is unavoidable. The ugly lump its loudly, proudly claiming a life of its own. Taking up extra space, threatening to go all over the place. It didn’t even take that long.
I scrub and scrub and scrub the hotel floor. The Sun outside was not warm. It was harsh and blinding. I rushed back to my room. They had left a cracked egg lying around on the floor. It reeked. Horrible stench. I cleaned and cleaned it until my hands were bruised. I hated how people were so beside themselves in their pursuit of God. It was as if they had lost their senses. No care for food, for smell, for home. Time was dilating for them. It was stretching. It was merciful for the subservient ones.
For me, there was still no time. Constantly battling between a semblance of life and elimination
Threatened by erasure. This unsightly being had only just recognized its named and it was already put under scrutiny. Blinding, hazardous rays. Splish. Splish. One by one, the cells were murdered in cold blood. The Earth was shrinking for it. It was writhing in pain, blinding, excruciating pain. This was like hell. Perhaps it was hell itself. But why was it being punished? Where did it come from? It wasn’t a conscious choice anyway. Consciousness was excruciating, too.
When wounds heal, they leave scars. For some, the scars remain. It mostly depends on pigmentation. It isn’t really your choice what color skin you are born with. Or which way your heart turns to.
The ugly lump now a horrible dark scar. Next to her heart. I see it too. I see it through her large kurtas. I see them as I wear them over and over again. Everything left after the darkness is now mine to behold.
And so I wonder, what becomes of black holes?
Were the soulless just dark agents of the Devil that consumed little girls and boys a little too early, are they unnecessary lumps on one body, or your heart that refuses to forgive, scars that remain dark, dark as death?
‘Miss, what becomes of a white hole when it enters a black hole?’
I could still feel a life within me in her old kurta after all those years.
‘Allah, Allah, Allah, just like this, even in your sleep, repeat his name so many times, the prayer on your mouth becomes the prayer in your heart. This is like music too, Uswa.’
‘The white hole persists,’ I say.
It must do.