THE TEMPEST HISSING

The rains are falling down and an old man is sitting beside the front door of the mosque, which is in the country side, glancing at the sky and listening to  the tempest sound, which arouses in him his childhood memories.   When playing under the rain with his young colleagues,   his father   saw him once and       shouted and threatened to hit him. Immediately, he ran to his house and defected to his mother from his father's madness deluge. The rain is still falling affluently. The old man leans his head on the wall smiling, pondering the rain drops and remembering his father again, his shouting and his words to his mother,"You are spoiling him", and her answer," He is our lonely son and he doesn't understand anything".

Lightning, thunder and cold freeze the bones. He shrinks    himself conjoining his knees to his chest. Some children are teasing him. They run in front of him. Some of them try to step on his foot, confidently. The old man groans from the pain with wonderful smile shines on his face, hoping that they can play outside the mosque. But the child don't listen to his wish and don't leave him alone until one of them saw a cat holding a kitty by it's teeth, trying to find a place to put it and protect it from the rains. The child called the others while he was running toward it. The cat stopped staring at the child, carefully. It was ready to plead when the child picked up a stone. But its blood was mixed with the rainwater. The cat fell down to protect the small kitty. The child kicked it  with his foot. The cat flew in the air and felt down again skidding on the ground before it ran toward it.    But the child stopped the kitty, which didn't get rid of him until a man came out from the mosque, shouting at them, so they ran away. The man continued while he was walking toward the cat, "Bad generation".

No rain, no lightning, no thunder and no humans. A deadly bores quietude. The people, who got out of the mosque, rescued him from that tune. He thanked those who  gave   him some tender, and asked   God to bless  those who talked  with him. Suddenly, he  stood up scowling, when a handsome young man got  out. He  stood in front of him  bringing out   some money from his pocket. At the same moment he tried  to offer him the money and their eyes  met; the young man couldn't move or breathe. But the old man didn't  share the same feelings. He picked  up the money from the ground and threw  it at the face of his lonely son.........

DOHA- NOVEMBER 199

DOHA- NOVEMBER 1996
* It was published in (Al-Sharq ) Qatari newspaper 28-11-1996.