The exile of the infidel

He lost his sense of the things around him, suddenly transformed into a raging tornado of anger, his hammer raised and struck it on the rock, and this repeated again and again until the spot trembled, and dust began to increase from the falling stones. The blows continued, and his entire body changed into hands that had nothing but slapping that mountainous area confronting him as if he was hitting everything he had lived through since he was a boy, hammering his prison, his absence, his despair of leaving this darkness, his overwhelming longing for his wife, the roar deafening his ears and preventing him from hearing anything else, the isolation expanding and extending, and the idea he did not want to face… He did not know that the body of the rock was collapsing in front of him, he was absent in his anger, united with his hammer in demolishing all the walls that faced him, he who is alone, absent, imprisoned, wounded, hungry, thirsty… The rock collapsed before him, and the ring opened onto the long tunnel, and water burst out strongly, carrying everything away. Tigriba al-Qafir - Zahran Al-Qasimi, winner of the 2023 International Prize for Arabic Fiction "Booker"