The Red Graveyard

By Shqipe Malushi

       In the valley of Kosova, not a long time ago, a girl with big blue eyes and a face shaped like a female deer was born. She spoke her first words from the day she was born. Her parents named her Besa (the Promise), and were very concerned about her signs of speaking, which to them meant nothing good.
       Beyond the mountains that surrounded Kosova, on the same day was born a boy named Fati (Destiny), who also spoke his first words from the day he was born. His parents weren't concerned about his sign of speaking at all. They actually thought it to be a gift and believed it would bring them all glory.
       During the winter festivities, when the valley was covered with white sparkling snow, and the rivers were frozen; the stalactites and stalagmites emerged from the mountains like magical life given to people in order to enjoy beauty. The mountaineers and the valley villagers gathered all together to celebrate the life of the winter season. During the festivities, people cooked their best foods, dressed in their best clothes, danced, sang, told stories and engaged their children while still in their cribs.
       Kosovars were strong people in their nature, with one basic belief: that everything began and ended with their land. They lived close to each other believing in their God, the knower of all things. Their word meant their life and once they promised something only death would have change it. Betrayal was not one of their traits.
       People like people, obeyed their traditions of birth, marriage and death, and no one ever questioned anything simply because nothing should be questioned. They accepted life as it was with all its good and bad.
       When babies were born,the parents chose their mates for them during the festivities of the four seasons, engaging them to each other and almost surely promising a good life on their behalf in sickness and in health, as long as they should live. And the children engaged in their cribs accepted their destiny without having any idea what was being promised about them. When they grew up they continued to live their lives just as their parents did.
       The neighboring people of other lands were unlike Kosovars and were amazed with the stillness of the life of their neighbors. The Kosovars seemed like nature itself, always unchanging, so strong, without doubts. Others wondered what gave these people the gift of acceptance while all the rest around could never make peace with themselves.
       That winter, when Besa and Fati were born, was one of the usual winters, except that the two children spoke from the day they were born. The celebration for the winter festivities had began. People gathered together and brought their children in order to show them to each other and engage them to other children.
       That winter Besa's parents wished to engage, her hopefully to a nice boy, and relieve themselves of the burden of their duty. After she was engaged they would begin making her dowry and all they had to do was watch her until she grows up to be fifteen summers. Then once she was married they would be free of their obligations.
       Fati's parents thought the same thing. It was not easy to find a good mate for their children at such an early age. It was a big task for parents, who wished nothing else but happiness for their children.
       When the celebration began in Kosova valley, people lit big fires to announce to God that just like fires they have been giving themselves to the land and to Him, burning all the way. After seven days of happiness and joy the parents began matching their children according to their age. The parents paid little attention to looks, but they did to family tradition. Once parents found the mates for their children and gave their word of acceptance in exchange a long term friendship began between the couples of the engaged children.
       Besa's parents waited almost until the end of the celebration to see who would ask for the hand of their daughter. But no one came. People seemed afraid of the little girl who was one month old and already spoke repeating her name Besa...Besa...Besa... This was the first painful sign for the parents that they might not be able to find her a lucky mate so easily.
       Fati's parents were of better luck. As soon as they arrived they've noticed a pretty looking little girl named Lule (Flower), sleeping in her crib. They engaged her for Fati. Both sides had much to give, riches and strength.
       On the last evening of the winter celebration, some people came to see Besa. They didn't say anything whether they liked her or not. They just asked for her hand for their deaf mute son named Deshprim (Despair), who was a few years older that she.
       Besa's parents accepted and congratulated each other, promising a good future to their children. They seemed pleased that they had accomplished their duty, not to leave their child to an unknown future.
       After the winter festivities, everyone went back to their homes and continued with their ordinary way of life. Except, this time a few of them had a task to fulfill, to keep a promise and see that nothing happened to their children until their marriage day. By securing their children's lives, they also secured their continuity in life and death. This was their way of giving God their word that they kept and fulfilled their duty.
       The children grew up through the changing seasons, and people took pride in their changes, admiring their beauties and envying those who did not have them.
       Besa, however did not grow up to be like other children. She was a very unusual child. Not only that she spoke from the day she was born, but she was so curious. She asked her father questions that no one had asked for generations.
       She questioned the celebrations of the four seasons, the engaging of the children, the traditions, the looks, the beliefs, the meaning of her name. And when she asked her father "Why?" he would look at her, frightened by her questions.
       " Because that's the way it is." He would answer. "Stop asking questions."
       Besa didn't look like other children. She was terribly thin, her white bones could be seen through her see-through skin. She had no hair at all, no eyelashes, no nails, no teeth. One of her eyes constantly teared a blue tear. She looked eternally clean and pure, as though blood didn't run through her veins. Her walk had the gracefulness of a female deer, making people turn their heads away not to look at her. They seemed afraid of her.
       People felt sorry for Deshprim (Despair), whose bride Besa would be. They wondered what and how he felt about her and what kind of children would she give birth to? Deshprim had to marry her. There was no way around this. His parents had promised and no one dared to break their word.
       During these years no one knew what Deshrpim thought about his strange looking fiance, since he was mute and he didn't express his feelings. People assumed that he had accepted his fate. Deshprim was a golden-haired boy destined to be a companion of silence. He played in the mountains, cutting branches and making small flutes, the sound of which he couldn't hear.
       Fati (Destiny) grew up to be a tall dark and handsome boy.His hair covered his eyes, which shone like two mirrors. He also grew to be a very curious child, asking his father many questions. He wanted to know how the land was worked, why they believed in it, why they didn't have any protection for it, and why they left everything to God. He wanted to know everything about his body, his feelings, and about the traditions. But when he asked his father, "Why?" the answer was, "Because that's they way it is, and the way it has always been."
       Fati grew to be very close to the mountains. He climbed every corner of them, talking to the trees and rocks and trying to find a more real meaning beyond the ordinary answers of his father. One day, when Fati had fallen asleep under a tree in the mountains he had a dream: He was dressed in his national costume on his wedding day, riding a white horse. In his hand, a sword shone beyond the mountains. He rode his horse galloping down the mountains toward the Kosova valley.
       The valley had been invaded by some strange-looking people, dressed in green helmets, who had stolen all the Kosova's children. And Fati with his white horse, rode among them and killed all of them, freeing Kosova's children.
       That day Fati went to his father, " I know what I want to be? "
       His father looked at him surprised. His son didn't have to be anything, he already was his son. "Yes?" said the father.
       "I had a dream," said Fati, " that I was a soldier of Kosova valley, and I protected it from its enemy.
       His father laughed. "But Kosova has no enemy, dear," he said to Fati. "We are people of peace and do not bother anybody. We need no soldiers. You better think that soon you will be married to Lule, this summer, when you are fifteen."
       "But this dream father. It felt it was so real. It was not like other times. It was more like telling me to be prepared for the future."
       Fati ignored his father and most of his days hiding in the mountains, exercising his body and learning new protection skills. He made spears from branches and dipped them into poison he made out of plants. He bowed to the Sun and asked him to give him the energy he would need to become the first soldier of Kosova.
       One early morning when he wandered about the mountains, he noticed a strange creature by the lake. She was taking a bath, and splashing the waters as though she was dancing with her shadow. He looked at her with wonder. He had never seen such a clean looking woman with no hair, so different from the others he had known -- daring to take a bath naked.
       He went closer to the lake to look at her. Her bathing seemed sacred. He noticed that she had no eyelashes, no nails, no teeth except a very happy smile, as though she was giving herself to the sun. She seemed magnetic and beautiful. Suddenly Fati caught himself having a desire to touch her.
       Besa noticed him standing behind the bushes and watching her in silence. She didn't run, but just sank her body in the water.
       "I am Fati," he said to her.
       "I know who you are," she answered. "Everyone knows you."
       "What are you doing here?" he said. "It's forbidden for girls to bathe naked!"
       "Just because of that, I like it." she said. "Promise you won't tell anyone."
       He promised her. Then she came out of the water dressed in her clothes and started chasing Fati up the mountains. They laughed, ate berries and hid behind big trees. He showed her all around the mountains, his trees, animals, rocks, spears. He taught her how to dance before the sun and ask him for energy. Then they fell asleep under the tree, tired from their happy play.
       He dreamt:
       Thousands of white wild horses were running freely through Kosova valley. Then a man with a green helmet, the same man as in his first dream, threw a black net over the horses, wanting to have them for himself. The horses didn't give up, they started resisting and fighting but as the net became tighter around them it crushed them against each other. The horses died and the blood covered Kosova. Fati then came riding one of the white horses right among the half dead and half alive horses.The horses looked him into the eyes and he understood their message. "Kill us, kill us. Please just don't let us be caught by the enemy," they said in their language.
       Fati then  touched horses eyes and they closed, as though falling into a deep sleep. He then stood all alone among the dead horses holding the black net of the man with the green helmet who stared at Fati and the horses laughing.
The man with the green helmet pulled his knife to cut Fati, but Fati threw the net back over on him and trapped him instead. The man then fell on his own knife and died. Once he was dead the white horses rose like mirages and ran to the mountains.
       Besa too, had a dream:
       She was in the middle of the mountains dressed in her wedding gown. She was looking for something but didn't know what it was. Then suddenly, all the trees bent and hugged her and they kept her warm,hiding her with their branches until the sun came down the mountains and took her on one of his rays. She rose gently with the sun toward the sky. Fati asked her not to go but she was too high up to come back. She didn't hear his voice,she only saw him standing near a white horse.
       When Fati and besa woke up, they told their dreams to each other and sworn never to tell anyone else. Then Fati told Besa about his vision and she believed him.
       They started meeting every day in secret from their families, continuing to discover the mountain and themselves. Fati finally knew someone who asked questions like himself, who wanted to know more than they were told. They played in the mountains, deepening into discovery. Together they went to discover caves. They build secret walls from rocks in case the enemy would come from that side. They built more spears.
       Months passed. Nothing changed in Kosova valley. People lived their lives in their usual order, doing their ordinary chores about the land and their houses. Only Fati and Besa had a secret life of the mountain that no one else knew. Besa had become a very skilled young women. She knew how to climb the trees, how to fish, how to shoot spears, swim and throw rocks at a distance.
       Together they invented a deer dance. They sang songs they made up, and they kissed and bathed together. No one witnessed this but the beauty of the mountains.
       One day after their bath, Fati had a strong desire to have Besa. He loved her, but he knew that to have her would be a sin, and her life would be in danger. Her husband to be could return her to her parents if she wasn't a virgin. They would know that she had been with someone else, and then they could' hurt her. He thought of all this but his desire was stronger.
       That day near the lake, still wet from their bath, the two young people became one uniting, their passion for each other. He possessed her with great gentility and she accepted him with great desire. That day she became a woman, even though she was fifteen summers old. And he became a man.
       They both learned about something deeper inside themselves. The two had merged into one. Their hearts had been one and now they didn't want to separate. But both of them had been engaged to different people, whom they had to marry because there was no other way.
       They continued to meet every day and they found amazement in belonging to each other. The more they belonged, the less they wanted to part. As time passed they thought the same thoughts, felt the same way and longed for each other every moment they were apart. Their bodies ached at night when they slept alone and apart from each other. The bond had become so strong,it seemed as though it was choking them when they were apart. As the bond was tighter, more they stretched it, it cut them through their bodies. They promised to each other never to separate, not even in death.
       During this time, Besa never thought of Deshprim, the mute fiance she was to marry. She never thought of herself either. She knew she was different. No matter what she did people,walked away from her. She expected nothing good from her future knowing that no one but Fati wanted her. People were frightened of her and she imagined how frightened poor Deshprim would be. Only Fati saw beyond her appearance. He saw the beauty that shone from inside her. He wasn't frightened of her.
       That night Besa had another dream that would repeat itself until her wedding day:
       She was dressed in her wedding gown and her father placed her in a carriage with eight white horses. Before anyone knew, the horses pulled the carriage and ran wildly. They were going to bring her to a new city, never seen before.
       When they came near Kosova valley, she saw that the valley had turned into a big pool of blood from one end to another. The horses stopped, not being able to cross. She stepped down from the carriage and stood looking.
       On the other side of the pool stood God. While she was mesmerized with His light he spoke to her: "You touched the depths of my love, through the flesh and blood of your own kind, born the same day as yourself. You are a daughter of my purity. Come to me now."
       "But how?" she asked. "There is blood between us!"
       "Come to me now, " God said again, "through it, from it, within it. Come to me now."
       Besa then entered the pool of blood in her white wedding gown. She didn't sink as she thought although the blood came all the way to her neck. But when she was on the other side, God was no longer there. She looked back from where she had come but there was no longer a pool of blood, only her wedding gown had turned red. Her body still was stainless. Before her stood the carriage with eight white horses. She stepped in it and horses pulled her toward the new city. When she arrived in front of the new city she saw that it was all white and made of her people's bones and skulls. She entered. Inside the city, a dead silence prevailed. Not a single soul was to be found alive anywhere. She walked around the city touching the cold bones and the skulls on the walls and, calling, "Fati, Fati, Fatiiiiiii. Where are you hiding?"
       Only the echo of her voice was heard which made all the walls break into the ruins behind her as she walked. Her path closed behind her as she walked forward looking for Fati. She never got out of the new city.
       Besa woke up the next day trembling. She wanted to go to the mountains and tell Fati her dream. She wanted to ask him to keep her in the mountains and never let her come down to the valley, but her parents told her that in few days she would be married to Deshprim and she could not leave the house. Besa cried for days but there was no way back.
       On the day of her marriage, all her peers were also to be married, probably Fati too. She would have to stand among them, enduring their looks and knowing they were going to laugh inside themselves, happy not to be in Deshprim's place. Often she had asked her mother, "Why do I look this way?" All her mother could say was, "Because God wanted others to see themselves through you." But people didn't look that way, and Besa couldn't accept that answer. She had been a lonely child since birth and now she had to stand among them who didn't want her.
       As preparations for the wedding of the youth came closer, Besa fell into a deep despair. Fati also felt as though wounded. He didn't want marry Lule. He and Besa had promised never to separate and now they couldn't even see each other. His body and soul were in pain.
       He knew one thing. Even though they are making him marry Lule, he would never touch her. He would become a soldier and wait for death to meet him. He would die rather than lose his beloved Besa. Yet he had no strength to break his father's word and take Besa and go into the mountains. He couldn't do that because the land had a tight rope around all of them and it wouldn't let them go.
       When the day of marriage came, all the brides were dressed in their wedding gowns including Besa, waiting for their carriages to bring them to Kosova valley where their fathers would give them to their husbands before God, letting them go to their new homes. People loved the day when all the Kosova brides vowed before God right there in the valley of their own land.
       Besa stepped into the carriage, crying. "What will be like to be in Deshprim's arms? " she thought. She had promised Fati never to separate, and she wasn't going to let Deshprim touch her. "Anyway he can't hear nor speak," she thought. "He can't tell anyone that I won't let him touch me. I will be free."
       Many fathers drove carriages toward the Kosova valley where the grooms were waiting for their brides.
       All the men, women, children had gathered, walking toward the valley and singing the marriage songs of belonging, of love, and separation. But when they all arrived at the valley, the horses stopped. In the valley, thousands of tents had been spread and men with green helmets and guns sat around, smoking cigars and laughing. No Kosova grooms were seen. People had never seen these kind of people before, dressed all in green. The Kosovars seemed to be paralyzed, not knowing what to think, not understanding the language of their visitors , yet sensing danger.
       For hundreds of years, Kosovars had lived in peace, never thinking twice about it, and now these green helmetic soldiers stood before them, ignoring them in their own land. This didn't look like a good sign to the Kosovars.
       She didn't have to marry Deshprim. While the other brides wept at this scene. Besa was happy.
       She would find Fati, and with him they would use all their spears on these green- people. She and Fati would free their people from the unpleasant visitors and then maybe people could let them be together. Happy thoughts came to her mind.
       All the grooms had been captured by the men with green helmets and their fathers tried to think of a way to free their sons. Kosovars realized that they were tricked without knowing how or why. They had never harmed anyone and now they were unprepared and unable to defend themselves. Before them stood an enemy in green, that caused them pain.
       Kosovars went back to their homes and decided to visit their visitors in peace, asking them why they were there, and asking them to free their sons. When they came before the tents to speak with the men dressed in silky clothes, the Kosovars said," What are you doing in our land?"
       The men in green looked at these peasants annoyed even at the question. "This is our land from now on," one of them answered. "If you don't surrender you are dead. You have no other choice."
       But the Kosovars didn't want to surrender. The next day they climbed the mountains to look for a place to hide until they would be prepared to attack the enemy. But surprisingly on the mountain they found the thousands of spears that Fati had been preparing for years. It had been a god's given gift so that very night they went back to the valley and attacked.
       The battle of Kosova valley between its people and the men in green lasted for seven days and seven nights. Many people were killed on both sides and much blood was shed.
   The men in green were surprised. They hadn't expected this strong resistance. But they disarmed and killed one by one all the Kosova's men annoyed for being tested this way.
       When the men didn't come back to their homes, Besa felt a strange pain in her chest. She was not going to let her father and Fati disappear in the valley by the hands of unknown men. She felt an unhappiness that was deeper than anything she had known before, when her people wouldn't look at her or play with her. This was like death with no return.But if she could find Fati the two of them could still live and be free....
       She remembered the lake and the laughter and their discovery each day anew. She felt a strong desire to break her father's oath and never come back home from the mountains. Now as though she was being punished for having had these thoughts, she had lost her father and Fati too.
       That night she called to all the Kosova brides asking them to come in their wedding gowns. Besa then gave each a knife and they rode their carriages to the valley.
       At midnight the brides silently entered the middle of the valley like shadows in wedding gowns dancing from a tent to a tent. They killed all the men in green. Then they jumped in their carriages and went back to their homes to take off their wedding gowns that had been stained with the blood. This bridal dance had caught the men in green turbans by surprise. Having been intoxicated by their victory, the green helmetic men thought it was a strange dream just a few seconds before they died.
       Besa in her bloody wedding gown stayed in Kosova valley, feeling the chilly night and the silence of the dead.
       She walked across chopped heads, limbs, broken bodies, scooped eyes, tongues, torned flesh. She was looking for Fati and her father. The smell of death prevailed in Kosova valley and the ground had a silent cry. Death and peace were present at the same time. The men in green were gone, Kosovars were gone. Only a lonely beloved bride was looking to find her life in death.
       Besa then began to turn the dead around looking into their faces if they had any. She cried and wailed.
       That night she buried one by one, all in the valley of Kosova not being able to separate an enemy from her people, in the darkness of the night. She was determined to give mother earth her sons and give her dead people their eternal rest. She owed this to her father and Fati. But she never found her father among the dead. He must have been among the remains.
       Suddenly just before the dawn, when almost most men had been buried, under a body of a man in green, she found Fati still breathing. She took him into her arms, kissed him, then ran to a tent and brought pitcher of water to wash his wounds and give him water to drink. He was alive.
       "Fati, my Fati," she cried. " Thank God. I knew it. I knew it."
       He opened his eyes, feeling the freshness of the water and smiled at her.
       "Remember our promise," he said, " never to separate."
        'I do."
       "Will you be my bride," Fati asked her again.
       "I do."
       "Kill me now," he asked her.
       "No," she said in pain " I can not do that."
       " Remember my dream. The horses, remember? Please help us to remain together. I no longer have a body."
       His body was cut from the waist down and the body who had been covering him had stopped his bleeding, which had kept him alive long enough to see Besa as his bride in a red wedding gown and wed her before the land.
       She pleaded him not to ask her to do that, begging him to stay.
       "I am the first soldier," he said. " Don't let me die like a coward, please."
       Then Besa took Fati's knife. The land was asking for her son. She stabbed his knife into his heart, then silently remained with his body until dawn.
       The next day all Kosova had turned into a red graveyard. Deshprimi who had been late to his wedding day was walking through the graves with his silent flutes. He was looking for his bride Besa. Over one grave he found a strange blue tear crystalized. He picked it up and put it on his palm. The tear shone and felt warm. The blue color that was crystalized looked deep, like those of the waters of the rivers he had seen before. Besa became Deshprim's only hope and dream. He never left the graveyard for he had loved her too in his silence, but she had had no way of knowing that.
       It is believed that the Kosova valley has swallowed the red graveyard in time, and Besa and Deshprim as well. She was turned into a strange red flower of life that only blossoms once a year in Kosova. No one picks it up, no one smells it,no one touches it for they say it is poisoned. They all know it was made of the Kosova bride's soul the night of the battle, who turned into a flower and even now it guards Kosova from an unpleasant enemy with green helmets.

Copyright 1999.
(Shqipe Malushi is an Albanian/American poet/writer living in New York.)
(212) 675-4380 ext. 351
E-mail: Malushi@Aol. Com;

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