Unlike Other Things... Two Days Early

Some basic facts:
I wrote this story a little over a year ago.
I'm very proud of my first effort - but not so proud that I'm okay with you hating it. So don't say if you do.
If it looks familiar, that's because I've based it on the story of Leili and Majnun.
The italics are on purpose.

...and now for the story:

A Newly Translated Piece. Love.

Breath. Love.
Sleep. Love.
Wake. Love.
Speak. Laugh. Enjoy. Love.
Balance. Love.
Think. Love.
Listen. Love.
Stand. Walk. Skip. Love.
Beauty. Love.
Sigh. Love.
Pray. Love.
Be. Joined and Knit Together. Love.

Breath. Love. His breath comes in ragged gasps now as they chase him through the streets. His feet pound the hard unforgiving pavement with the syncopated rhythm common to those who are hunted, those who must anticipate the actions and reactions of others. He smelled her once. Would know her scent anywhere. Night-blooming jasmine in her hair and the sweet fragrance of orange on her lips and fingers.

Sleep. Love. Had he ever known life before her? He imagines what it must be like, to watch her sleep. How the moon would rejoice in its fullness to see her thus; how the nightingales of paradise would compose their sweetest melodies in her honor. Mirroring his despair, the moon is darkly absent tonight as the guards force him, in their relentless pursuit; farther from the spot he first knew true happiness.

Wake. Love. It was as though she walked out of a dream. He remembers the smell of jasmine first, how it seemed to manifest the delicate confidence and composure in her being. She sat at the corner table, peeling an orange; but she could have held the sun. It is the sun in her smile he dreams of now as he races through the sinewy alleys of town. The guards shout like baying wolves who smell the end of their prey’s endurance.

Speak. Laugh. Enjoy. Love. A humble student, he passed the same corner café every day for two years on his way to university. He had a funny habit of reading as he walked that secretly delighted her. She had never seen anyone like him before. Her father was the Dean of Education and had taken a post in this small exotic town with its narrowly twisted streets and alleys when her mother died. Her only link with her mother was the books she left behind and a few precious cuttings of night-blooming jasmine. He rounded the corner with his book in hand, furrowed brow indicating the birth of genius, lips moving with half-formed thoughts discarded or transcended as the need arose. Breathing deeply, he looked up from his studies.

Balance. Love. His life, then as now, seemed to hang in the balance. An eternity screams by in seconds, but then it was only the sirens, or it was the rush of blood to his head. The muscles in his legs, the air in his lungs, his dreams are all stretched tight as he nimbly navigates the maze of streets. Thoughts of her sweet smile and dream-like gaze float through his consciousness and seem to propel him forward. He has left behind the twisted streets near the university for the mansion crowned hills circling the city.

Think. Love. It must be a case of mistaken identity. He had never been in trouble this way before; in fact, he spent most of his time engrossed in his studies. He had been reading a newly translated piece written in the mystical Sufi tradition when he saw her. Her smile lit her whole face, and while her eyes shone brightly like the dawning of a new day, there yet remained a full spectrum of emotion. Dawn breaks as he approaches the spired heights of the new city. Ever mindful of the damning shadow he casts in the new day sun, he leaves the main road seeking refuge in tree-lined boulevards.

Listen. Love. Visibility is low in early dawn light. His pupils are almost fully dilated to catch the cues necessary for escape. His ears, ignoring the fierce pounding of his heart, are tuned to the subtle nuances of his would be captors. He heard her laugh, but almost missed it in the beginning. It was joyful and quite simultaneous with his first vision of her. He was sure that he had something to do with it, but she never made him feel isolated or alien; it was rather the kind of laugh one dreams of coming home to.

Stand. Walk. Skip. Love. She laughed in that moment. He so reminded her of her father – and reading the work he had so lovingly translated for her mother. Those poems were her mothers’ favorite, for her they represented all that was good and pure in the world. Her mother would read them aloud as she skipped around the garden, or gathered oranges for their mid-morning snack. The language was so beautiful, wonderfully describing a seeker’s journey through seven valleys; that was why she loved the new house she and her father lived in. For although they were in the newer part of town on the hill and therefore more removed from city life, she had a fantastic view of the valley below which she could enter at any time and seek the lessons of life.

Beauty. Love. She was beautiful to say the least, it was the way her eyes projected the depths of her soul. Like he could drown in one glance and having done that be reborn in the purity of her essence. If he ever escapes this waking nightmare he thinks he could do that forever, drown and be reborn in her eyes. He has turned north, south, and east again so many times he pauses, sure he has lost or at least confused the guards. There. That sound. Quickly he slips between two buildings so as to escape detection.

Sigh. Love. It was just a bird settling on the branches of orange tree heavy with fruit. The pause lasts as long as a sigh of longing, a passing wish or dream of freedom, of love. Her countenance was such that he had to close his eyes for a moment to regain his composure. Thoughts of her take his breath away; leave his thoughts scrambling for cohesion and structure. He takes flight moments after the bird. Sigh. Peace seems just a dream now. His refuge has become a dead end.

Pray. Love. He looks around, frantically. The guards are just behind him now; he can hear their gasps for air and just make out their static motions as they creep ever closer through the alley. With thoughts of her seared in his mind and the scent of oranges and jasmine clouding his senses he prays for deliverance as he scales the wall before him and lands in a garden. Paradise.

Be. Joined and Knit Together. Love. She looks up from her studies as a bird takes flight from one of the orange trees she loves so much. There. That sound. Quickly she slips under the cover of the tree and watches, amazed, as her true love leaps down from her wall. Eyes first wide in fear, then amazement, then wonder. It was as though he walked out of a dream.