Ìjàpá O

The origin of god

The mosque is just down this road. Sometimes it's too beautiful outside. He has often said what did we do to earn the sky? The mother died today. Or yesterday. He has just heard. Not far, a rabble of pink butterflies dance around a hedge of white petals too bright in midday sun. He has never seen butterflies this color before, not on this campus even, where he has seen more butterfly colours than everywhere else put together. Seven years now. The butterflies look like fairies: a sprinkling of magic: too pretty for this world but it's so pretty also, sometimes, like now: too much beauty to see: you look up and it's art, just there free of charge. The butterflies are drinking or floating, dipping and rising and no one can say why they never rest. Butterfly, butterfly. Float away on the wings of a butterfly, butterfly. She went softly (this was the sister), sleeping, the best to hope for. Plant a wet kiss on my face, butterfly. Went like an angel, in the way of the prophets, we should give thanks, we give thanks, ALHAMDULILLAH, come home Adam we are expecting you. When she visited him, this sister, they strolled and she said there are more trees than buildings on this your campus. That was last year. Overhead, a bird is flying across: karrh, karrh! Have seven years really passed? Come home Adam, she had said then too. Tonight she will say again but that is not what convinces him. He can smell the pollen in the air, makes him want to puke. He's not a butterfly. Yet is he: pretty. Pretty like a butterfly, butterfly. Pretty like a girl, as is generally accepted. (Men have said. Many men have said.) This is what he said to the sister last year: she hasn't changed (mind, attitude, words). She hasn't apologized. She hasn't called. And she said (the sister): she won't but come home Adam it's been almost a year. From here he can see the mosque well. It is just down the road, past the pink butterflies drinking sweetness, and overhead a bird is passing, passes. Karrh, karrh! Arrives on the moon of the little mosque which is definitely down this road. The mosque buried the mother: (the sister). No son of mine. Karrh, karrh! He doesn't know about birds but this one is a crow, pure of heart. He can talk to the sister: she gets him: or gets him most. The mother does not get him. (*did) The other sister is ten. The father keeps an eye open from the back of beyond: a twinkling star: has always done and been. Only the sister then, this sister, though she doesn't always agree. But unlike the mother whom she's otherwise mostly like and most like of all three except Adam and come home Adam it's been over a year she said on that walk last year and it really has been seven years—my god!—walking this same road for seven years and the mosque is surely at the end of it with a crow on its moon and midway a magic show of pink butterflies which he has never seen before and it's all so beautiful sometimes the world is too beautiful like now… And unlike the mother, well, I'm educated, that means something, and I'm young enough, open, you can't teach an old dog a new trick Adam, though she doesn't accept you accept her Adam, I accept you Adam, but you can't say He's not there, It's real Adam, if you're lucky you'll see something. Or hear something. Or feel something. Before you die. I pray you'll be lucky. INSHA ALLAH. And I pray it won't be too terrifying. I'm praying for you Adam. Before you die. Now the mother is dead. She died yesterday. More likely today. The mosque has buried her. They buried their matron saint, Alhaja wa, Ìya wa, the sister said. And then she said at least now you can come home Adam. The bird takes off from the moon, glides slowly down and forward. Past the pretty pink butterflies. Stops. Let us take a moment to look again at the pretty pink butterflies: the bird turns awkwardly on its two black feet: the pink butterflies are not pink but white. Only the mosque is at the end of this road. There are no other buildings (quarters, faculties, laboratories). Instead there is green, and there is brown, and crimson and yellow and white. And the great blue sky above it all. There was pink but now it is white. And: the bird…talks. ALLAHU AKBAR, ALLAHU AKBAR!! A talking bird! Turns back awkwardly on its two black feet to him: points its black beak to God so we all can see its fine pure heart, and: ALLAHU AKBAR, ALLAHU AKBAR!! The bird talks. He doesn't know about birds but this one talks. And the now-white butterflies are drinking or floating, dipping and rising and no one can ever say why they never rest. So come home Adam and come home Adam we have been expecting you.

Ìjàpá O is a gender queer writer and performance artist living in and working out of Ibadan, Nigeria. They are a preacher of Love.