They will later say that what happened was impossible. Now, the distant ones claim it is an adventure, and I say it's a birth. Small truths were once only big dreams; it's merely a matter of time. This is how stories begin and end. A miracle is nothing more than a strange embryo growing in the womb of despair and unexpectedly becomes part of things that seem incomplete without it.

I always heard about the grave of the saint Abdul Ati and his tree, but I never cared. My mother used to visit all the saints’ graves, scattered in every neighborhood and along the path of every village, pouring oil and prayers over my eyes to melt mountains of silence and stubbornness, but nothing happened.

Blindness was something destined from the beginning to the end. Years have passed since those days when my mother would carry me on her shoulder, wading into an endless sea. I could feel the distance on her forehead when my hand slipped over it, touching a flood of unfortunate sweat. We always returned from the saints’ graves the same as we went; my mother lighting our way with her tearful, hopeful eyes, and I gauging the journey from the sweat on her forehead.