Nathaniel Box

Mahmud of Ghazni      

    

Mahmúd of Ghazni would sit upon embroidered carpets that were lavished with courtly abstracts, designed in accordance with infinity--fit for the believer seeking God. Ayáz the slave, facing his king, would perch himself on the end of that rug, which extended to the end of the court (to the end of infinity). But the form of that beardless youth--not unlike the Húri attending the faithful in His Janna--could never be further than his own breath's length. The others, his attendants and friends, whispered of his companion's plainness, but Mahmúd the King had eyes to see that pearl of the quality of sea-foam--At once temporary, but eternal, like the milk spilled on the sleevles arm of the fairest maiden or the fleeting sight of His glorious Maláika--one of God's mercies... Then the king would swallow the feeling. "A mercy?" He'd try to make reason, but the wine-tinted thoughts would cross his mind, in dizzy grape-flavored moments. "O', the Lord my God!" the king would then cry, bemoaning his heart. He would recall that jihad Abú Núwás wrote about--the one that imprisoned him. He would moan against that simmering ecstasy, that fall of Paradise, that sin Sodom remembers.