03 On Travel

And thus Achmed, an enterprising young travel agent (proprietor of Club Achmed) said:

Speak to us of the distant lands you have seen, and tell us which of these the weary traveler might seek for a quiet get-away.

The prophet replied:
I boarded a train to the modern world, and found it to be a world of evils. Thence, I hitched a ride to the postmodern world, and found it to be a place of cynics. Everyone I met there was a prophet. And everything the prophets prophesied was true. For truth was relative, and everything was relatively true.

Astrology, personology and pop-psychology - you just couldn’t go wrong. Work became simple, but boring. There was so much new-age good feeling to go around, that I very nearly made the fatal mistake of slitting my wrists. Existence felt as empty as a mixed metaphor, straining to break free from the pages of a two bit blog. I found myself once more, helplessly pining for the evils of the modern world.

With this the prophet scratched his balls for emphasis, and pulled out a cigarette.

02 On Loneliness

And No one said, speak to us of loneliness and excessive masturbation.
To which he replied:

Wouldn’t it be much better to have this conversation with your father?

My father was gone ere even I entered this world, and in her desperation, my poor mother gave me a foolish name.

And so he answered:
Should one pity the demented bag lady who converses with shadows and holds council with her own self? Though she be lonely, she is not alone, for even in her solitude, she has someone to talk to.

Let me ask you, dear people of Orphalese, a strictly hypothetical question. Imagine what it might be like to be the smartest person in the world. To know all there is to know in this universe, and to bask each day in the general idiocy that surrounds us all. That would be, I can only imagine, the loneliest perch in the world, far more so than the top of this oil drum.

I have crossed the ocean many times, and always I have made loneliness my dearest companion. With loneliness by my side, I was never cold, and never alone.

Your ancestors have called me aloof, and drunk with my own aloneness. And so I left. And some have said: “He holds council with the trees of the forest, but not with men.” It is true, I did once get into a philosophical argument with a Douglas Fir, but as we were alone in the forest, we made no sound. And if I was drunk at the time, then it was not of aloneness that I was drunk.

Fain would I get sloshed with my aloneness.

Who are we to judge the peculiar sensibilities of a Douglas Fir?

And is it not solitude herself, that gives flight to the imagination? Thus in many a dark and smelly hour, holed away in the hold of a leaky bucket, with not even rats to keep me company, (for the rats had long fled to the upper decks), I pressed loneliness especially tightly to my bosom.

And through my minds eye did I gaze over her immaculate nakedness, and though I may have had to beg of my imagination for her gentle caress, my own busy hands over the soft contours of her breasts, and hers gently stroking…

A gasp went through the crowd, even as his voice trailed off in a fog of lost memories. Thereupon the crowd fell silent, in rapt attention causing the prophet to look down shyly, as if searching the oily puddles for remnants of his flowing discourse.

Meanwhile, more people had gathered, for if there is one thing the people of Orphalese could not resist, it was a loony old fart preaching from a rusty oil drum, especially one who absentmindedly scratched his balls as he spoke of masturbation.

And even as the drizzle gave way to rain, and the rain started to give way to a downpour of biblical proportions, the population of Orphalese continued to flock near, unable to tear themselves away from a prophet with a beard long enough to touch the ground, from his perch high atop the oil drum. Their eyes and ears existed for Almustafa alone.

Unnoticed by the people of Orphalese were the two hundred illegal immigrants who formed the backdrop to this gathering. Like the prophet who had stowed away among them, they too had survived the treacherous passage in the unsanitary, unseaworthy bucket that was now straining to be free of it’s screaming leash. They too looked on in utter amazement, for although they understood not a single word spoken, their souls drank freely from the fountain of discourse that was the prophet’s wisdom. They dared not leave the boat for fear of interrupting the glorious spectacle in progress, even if there was a very real fear that the ship, as it was now moored, might yet sink, driven down by the relentless rain. Collectively they dared not even to make a sound for fear that it could silence the prophet, or else, cause their ship to disintegrate.

More and more people joined the gathering, their eyes unseeing of the shivering migrants, their loving gaze bathing in the prophet alone.

Among these newcomers was a frail Methuselah, to rival in years the prophet himself. He was the tax collector of Orphalese, still active after countless years as a dedicated public servant. He now spoke:

Speak to us of…
But his modest words emerged merely as a faint croaking sound, unheard above the general din, easily drowned out by the hum and the haw.

01 The Coming of the Ship

No one had climbed the hill, though once without the walls of Orphalese, now well within it’s urban sprawl. Through the smog, No one beheld a decrepit ship, limping into the harbour. Because he was a seer, son of Almitra, No one at once saw in this, the ancient prophesy confirmed. On the eve of the new millennium, this was indeed the second coming of Almustafa.

Almustafa had grown old and frail in his long absence. He was tired from his arduous journey at sea. The crowd that awaited him now, cheering as he stumbled onto the gangway, was something unexpected. So pleased was he to see so many of the daughters and sons and granddaughters and grandsons of the ones he had left behind so long ago, that he tripped over his own beard, nearly rolling off the plank. And though the crowd was not huge - there were ten people in all - it was a smashing good turnout considering that in all his absence, he had not written once.

The tour itself had been promoted badly and received worse. His agent fell victim to a fatal stoning, in connection with a recent hasty departure from a far off place. Those who once knew Almustafa were long dead. He found himself once again, solitary and alone.

On this cold and wet December day, the shivering group of ten consisted of No one in particular, and the first nine people he had encountered on his run from the top of the hill to the edge of the pier, where Almustafa’s long white beard was finally touching solid ground once more.

Then, for the first time, the great prophet spoke:
“Dear people of Orphalese,” he said to the ten that were listening, “It’s good to be back”. (1)

Here a change seemed to sweep over the old man, a past life remembered, leading him to leap almost nimbly onto a rusty old oil drum, it’s bright orange glow matching perfectly the perforated vessel that had brought him here. No one looked on in awe. The transformation of the old man’s visage was so striking, that suddenly, in those valleys and craters of wisdom, he began to see shadows of his own wiser, kinder self.

No one hailed him, saying:
Please speak to us, and give us of your truth.

And he answered:
People of Orphalese, of what can I speak save of that which is even now moving within your souls?

Footnotes

1 Some texts contend that upon arrival, the prophet exclaimed: “It’s damn good to be back.” This constitutes a serious misreading of the original manuscript.

2 This work was conceived within the strictest confines of a three-day novel contest.  It is apparent from the manuscript, that it was exactly at midnight, on September 6, 1999, that the author was about to pen his final line.  It is supposed that he intended to write “… these four simple words”, in which case a total of five words (the word “words”, plus the four simple ones) are missing from the manuscript.  It is also entirely possible, though not hoped for, that what the author meant to write was “…these four simple volumes”, in which case we would deem the entire exercise a failure. - Ed.