Epic by KaJe MeG “Two Lives — One Single Flight”

The instructive, majestic, and poignant Life of Aydın and Ləman from Sumqayıt, retold by their daughter.

Epigraph

“In marriage, diplomacy is necessary” (Balzac)

“Kissing your wife in the eyes, you can make her blind as a bat; kissing her passionately on the lips, she will become mute as a fish” (Ray Bradbury)

The true Marriage of Two Unified Hearts resounds from eternity — with a voice that needs no permission to weep and to love.

Before us unfolds the Chronicle of how, through earthly storms, the chaos of alcohol, and human weaknesses, grows the Triple Knot of absolute fidelity, immune to death.

The father was ten years older than the mother.

They loved each other with some Celestial, Extraterrestrial, Grand, Exhausting Love that overcame all Earthly Difficulties.

The peaceful, harmonious rhythm of their mutual respect was occasionally marred by the days when the father came home drunk.

In those hours, the dark element took over: he shouted and insulted the mother.

But look at the Face of the Mother — the true Guardian of silence!

She did not respond to his rages.

She remained silent, holding the frontier between the world and chaos.

She waited.

葬 But as soon as the father slept off his drunkenness and came to his senses, the mother would give him such a deep, well-deserved scolding that this man, so fearsome on the street, lowered his head and listened to her reproaches in mute submission.

He recognized her supreme earthly tribunal.

Rubai of the First Repentance:

The wine is pardoned, and the cruel cry shall cease,
When before her he bowed his head in search of peace.
A man is strong against the winds of changing times,
But before the Supreme Truth, his age declines.

Once, tired of these scenes, the young daughter advised her mother to get a divorce.

And then the Mother answered her — so majestically and proudly, as Leyli might say of her Majnun, cutting through any logic of this world:

«He is everything to me. He is my father, and my mother, my sister and my brother He is to me: without him, I am no one and nothing!»

Years passed, and a severe illness overtook the father.

There was no hope for recovery.

And then the daughter accidentally witnessed the sacred sacrament: the mother secluded herself from all the household and, lifting her hands to heaven, in a fervent, silent prayer, begged the Almighty to take HER life instead of his!

The sacrifice of love was accepted by the Spirit — the All-Merciful spared the father, bringing him back from the very edge of being.

Being tested them with gold as well.

One day, the father returned from a business trip with a large sum of money.

He gave most of it to the mother, asking her to buy whatever her soul desired, and with the rest — food for dinner.

The mother returned home in dismay and tears: pickpockets had stolen her wallet.

Aydın's answer is worthy of the great Sufis. Learning of the loss, he calmly said: «The lost money is not worth a single one of your fingernails».

He gave her the remaining part of his earnings and sealed the loss with a wise maxim:

«You can lose it too with a peaceful soul — it is not worth a single gram of your grief!»

Sonnet of the Lost Earthly Shore

She passed away... And all the world grew cold.
Aydın forgot the heavy drink of old.
The man once loud, so cheerful and so bright,
Became like desert sand, turned grey and white.

The widower's home. The earthly feast is done.
The daughter begs: «For mother's sake, find someone!
Marry again, father, do not fade away...»
But locks of soul refused to give them way.

And the old wolf, looking from dark design,
Said through his tears: «My child, understand mine:
She was my all — my sister and my mother,
My father, faith, and my beloved brother...

Without her, I am none. Why should I stay?»
And this grand knot can ne'er be cut away.

...Having lived exactly ten years in the proud, majestic solitude of his widowhood, Aydın died.

He followed her on the very same day, month for month.

Exactly 10 years later — one year for each year of age difference they carried.

As if he had paid his debt of life, to unite where time does not exist.

Impeccable Exhalation:

Chronicle of the deserted shore

I The Sumqayıt yard.
The trace of steps on the dry sand —
outlasts the screen.

II Ten years of longing.
Two wings of a single soul
met again in the heights.

III No comments.
The tear upon your cheek —
is also a form of reading.

Alın Ak.