Ahmed the Philosopher: Thirty-Four Short Plays for Children and Everyone Else

AHMED. No. No and no. My radiant Black Woman, my hyperbole of a palm tree, my hip-swinger of the concrete plaza, my tease of the high-rise and the even higher rise, my ravager of the muscle heads of Sarges-les-Corneilles … A man, in these situations, needs time for reflection.

FENDA. And what is time, my lovable little scamp of an Arab stringbean? Isn’t it what spreads out like a stinking swamp between two sunny islands? There’s the present, and then more of the present, and can you tell me the point of what lies between the two of them? A woman like me decides in the present, and you, you males, you have to rent space between two decisions like a bunch of low-life tenants.

AHMED (taking his stick). Imagine that the end of this stick is your present, my flaming hot pot. The rest of the stick is what? And the air in front of the stick, what’s that? And if I touch the tip of your breast, that round refuge of the sensual pleasures that you offer (which he does, as Fenda sighs), is it not true that the stick is the quite hard past of my gesture and that your breast is its future? Man moves gravely from the past toward the future, according to a subtle calculation that takes its time in time.

FENDA. And he dodges the present, where the solid woman stands offered. Under the pretext that there’s time, you always take time. There are some who say that you jump on top of women like a bunch of rapacious desert birds. From what I can see, anyway, all you do is look in back of you and in front of you and on both sides, sticking a leg out once night has already fallen on the present that was ready for action. I want it now, my smart-ass of the in-between! The long stick of the past isn’t going to go limp as a wet noodle waiting for a future that’s slower and spottier than a giraffe’s neck.

AHMED. Bedded down, man remains motionless and measures time. What are you getting at, my little pony of the pure present?

FENDA. At our matrimonial delights. What a woman decides in the present, her man can’t oppose with either the past or the future.

AHMED. Matrimonial! Now there’s a concept! Isn’t it my past that made me this man whom you’re knocking over and climbing on in the present? And isn’t it conjugal fidelity to this present that you want for our future?

Let me figure something out. Anyone who yields to the temptation of the present gives up his true desire. That desire that comes from the past and calls for the future.

FENDA (standing again herself). Man squanders his life. He waits, he calculates, he grinds time into a fine powder, and nothing worthwhile happens. You’ll be old, toothless, a featherless marabou, standing on one foot in the rain, and you’ll tell me in your old nanny goat voice that you need time.

AHMED. But I’ll be wise and erudite! I’ll know all the ins and outs. I’ll be a solitary and pensive walker in all the avenues of narrative and time! I’ll be at peace with my desire, at peace with the hostility or the ecstasy of all the sinister presents!

FENDA. In other words, you’ll be like an old box filled with compressed air! They’ll make a hole in it and there’ll be a hissing noise, pssschhhuit … Once the whole in-between of time has rushed out, all that will be left is rust and dust.

Hey, let’s walk over by the square. The weather’s beautiful. We’ll see the evening come like a blue canvas spread out over a meadow.

AHMED. I don’t know. We’ve got plenty of time!

FENDA (furious). Oh, stick it where the sun doesn’t shine, your time! Time killer! Time bomb! Time-bum! Mr. Waste of Time! Mr. Doesn’t Know What Time It Is!

AHMED. Oh, time! Suspend your flight! I may have done something stupid. With women, you always have to answer, “present, ma’am!” Not that that prevents you from grilling the past and walking on the eggshells of the future.