ترجمات أدبية

by Ali Al-Kasimi

Translated by Hassane Darir (Professor of Translation and Terminology, Cadi Ayyad University, Marrakech) and revised by W Richard Oakes Jr. (PhD-University of Edinburgh, Independent Scholar)

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Darkness was enveloping the trees and plants of the public garden, giving him the impression of long and short black ghosts with many moving arms, like a huge dark octopus. Last night's rain had frozen on the ground, here and there, resulting in frost that breaks under his feet. A snowy wind blew through the cap he was wearing, stinging his ears, nose, and lips, turning them red as the mane of a rooster. His gasps of successive breaths chimed with the chatter of his teeth and the trembling of his limbs. As he was vigorously running, a dark heap appeared to him on the side of the lane. He had no time either to glimpse at or linger on that heap; he only thought of it as a heap of stones brought in to restore the fence of the public garden, or a heap of branches gathered from trimming trees. It doesn't matter.

At the dawn of the next day, he set out, as usual, to jog in the public garden next to his house. In the semidarkness, he glimpsed the heap still in place on the side of the lane. When he approached it this time, he felt a suspicious movement. He had no time to look closely or meditate too long, for he had to come straight home to shower, eat breakfast, and go to work in the factory by seven o'clock. For this reason, he contented himself with assuming that the movement came from one of the stray dogs or cats that take refuge in the garden. It doesn't matter.

On the third day, as he was running close to the same heap in the same place on the side of the lane, he saw what looked like a hand outstretched from it. After a few steps he stopped running to turn back to her, and stare at her. Behold, an old woman draped in a black cloak, was leaning her back against a large tree in the garden. He bowed his head in silence for a moment, then put his hand in his pocket, took out some money, and put it in the hand that was out in the open. But it did not take the money, so it fell to the ground. He picked up the money, put it back in her hand, and alerted her by calling her, but she remained silent, and did not take the money. He touched her palm, and moved it gently, perhaps she fell asleep while sitting. But a terrible cold ran from her hand to his fingers, spreading a wave of chill and apprehension all over his body. Before he had time to think it over, the woman's entire body tilted with that slight movement, and she fell to the ground, lifeless.

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