He had not looked at himself like this in a mirror for years. That was a long eyebrow. 

Nothing can keep him from her. When he is not in the desert with Madox or with Bermann in the Arab libraries, he meets her in Groppi Park—beside the heavily watered plum gardens. She is happiest here. She is a woman who misses moisture, who has always loved low green hedges and ferns. (While for him this much greenery feels like a carnival.) From Groppi Park they arc out into the old city, South Cairo, markets where few Europeans go. In his rooms maps cover the walls. And in spite of his attempts at furnishing there is still a sense of base camp to his quarters. 

 

 

They lie in each other’s arms, the pulse and shadow of the fan on them. (All morning he and Bermann have worked in the archaeological museum placing Arabic texts and European histories beside each other in an attempt to recognize echo, coincidence, 

name changes—back past Herodotus to the Kitab al Kanuz, where Zerzura is named after the bathing woman in a desert caravan. And there too the slow blink of a fan’s shadow. ) And here too the intimate exchange and echo of childhood history, of scar, of manner of kiss. 

 

 

“I don’t know what to do. She saya." How can I be your lover? ”