Emotion is a strong word. And so too is the word landslide. A landslide is an avalanche, but in a place that knows not snow. It is earth, rock, debris from the dreams you didn’t follow through, dinosaur bones, and, death. Emotion and landslide met in a dimly lit bar, hit it off and then got hitched after a brief courtship. Soon after a child was sired, the child was aptly named emotional landslide. I have sparred with this child many a time in my brief life. And with age I have come to be quite proficient at parrying her attacks. And then one day, from out of a blind spot, came a hearty blow. Emotional landslide had dished out havoc, in the form of an untranslatable word, and had buried me almost literally, twice.
Ya’aburnee is an Arabic word that means ‘you, bury me’. If someone is so dear to you that you would sooner die before said person than live on without him or her. Then Ya’aburnee is the word you tell that person, because life after them loses its fizz. Your life’s work had been all about finding that someone, that other half. And you do. Ya’ll buy a cozy house, settle down, manufacture four children, invest in a boat and name it the duo, finish each other’s sentences and grow old together. And then when you least expect it, after all the ya’aburnees you’ve said over the decades, her life is snuffed and it’s up to you to lay her to rest.
Life is a bitter pill. And life is also a bottle of soda packed with so much fizz, it pops the lid and takes your right eye as an offering. There is tragedy in this world and in fiction as well, case in point Romeo and Juliet. I have yet to target anyone with the potent Arabic word, much less fire it. One day I shall find love, and I will maim her with it. And when she betrays me and dies ahead I will know that she meant her words, and that she loved me so. I will cherish her in death and love her in life so that there is effervescence in both.
Love like potato and tomato, who became chips and sauce so that they could be together in the afterlife.
If I only could, make a deal with God, and get him to swap our places, be running up that road, be running up that hill, be running up that building, if I only could ahh ahh, no problem – Placebo
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Hawkins Harry ( @manlymanharry ) identifies as an instrumentalist; at the sound of one hand clapping.
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