my brother sends his best  

says Nemanja’s brother and shoots his gun just once  

my father’s warm body tumbles into the dead leaves, his big eyes fixed on him, my father’s big eyes locked into Nemanja’s brother’s eyes, his strong hands grab my father and turn him to the setting sun, he’s exalted by the sight of his fingers in blood, wipes them on Murash’s shirt, the heralds of death spread the news, they shot Murash, Murash was killed, Murash was felled next to the wild pomegranate trees, next to the pomegranates, Murash, Murash, Murash, my mother wails and sinks into her skirt in the middle of the road, Murash, my life, the wind carries the howls of the heralds, the howls catch up to my mother on the dirt road leading up to our home and knock her down to the ground, she sinks into her skirt on the dirt road leading to our house, four broad-shouldered men stride up the dirt road to our home, carrying my father’s body on four beech branches, the road is uneven, the pall-bearers’ bodies are bent, they trip over their feet, my father’s body rises and falls like a cough, they set the body down at my feet, it no longer moves, now I’m bound to ask everything the Kanun decrees, I have to ask the pall-bearers what I must ask them, I open my mouth, only hot air escapes, hot air into the cold stares of the bearers’ faces, the hot air that is no longer escaping my father’s lips, come on, Matija, they mutter into their collars, avoiding my eyes, they don’t wish to see the death of the father reflected in the eyes of his daughter, they’d rather see death in the eyes of the man than in the eyes of his daughter, they want to lie in their beds tonight unperturbed, yet I have to stand, self-possessed, I clear my throat and I ask, what have you brought me  

a wound or death

Bekija  

I swear to the ruler of the Albanian Alps, Lekë Dukagjini,  

that to my dying day, to my dying day I shall not touch a man, I shall not touch a man and I shall preserve my virginal innocence, renouncing for all times the woman in me 

renouncing forever the woman in me  

I will submit to this oath before God, I shall not succumb to the wicked desires of the flesh, and today, before the twelve-man council of elders, I shall take the masculine name Matija as my only given name and may the women cut off my hair and may my dresses turn to ash and may the clothes of a man become one with my back, my legs, my skin  

my back, my legs, my skin  

I swear, for as long as I am of sound body and mind, that I shall keep my oath, fastened together with my hair and my honour, as God, and these fathers, are my witnesses  

I, Matija, the son, will look after my family, I will provide for them all that is needed, all that the Kanun decrees as necessary, for sloth is the enemy of the soul, and I will henceforth, at appointed hours, occupy myself with manual labour, for only when I live off what my hands have borne can I be a monk of principle, and if I shall blessedly keep this oath, and suppress indecent acts and not break my word, then may I enjoy a life that is long and may I be surrounded by universal reverence, and if I violate and desecrate this oath, may the opposite befall me  

in the name of the sky and the earth, this stone, this weight and for this bread  

I am sworn

Matija  

I exit the church and for the first time in my life I feel the ice-cold Albanian air on my head, I must resemble a shorn donkey, my braids lie on the church floor, to part with something you’ve had forever turns out to be easy as the wind, now they’ll burn my dresses too, down to the last one, except for my future wedding dress, the one my grandmother gifted me before she died, together with a pair of white patent-leather shoes, she’d laid out the dress next to the clothes she’d picked out for her own funeral, come here, child, she said, I want to give you something, but grandmother, I said, there are two dresses here, which one is for me, she and I were the same height, she died after she slaughtered a sick baby goat and its blood poisoned hers, here, my child, she said, take this as dowry for the wedding, both dresses were beautiful, one was a red velvet, the other sky blue, I went for the blue one, the shoes were shiny and white, Bekija, you took the wrong dress, put it back, I’ve picked out this one for when I depart this earth, no, grandmother, that’s the one I like, I hate red, you take it, here, take it, I never once wore that dress, it’s still in the cupboard with the white patent-leather shoes, I hid them before my oath so they wouldn’t burn them, I almost wore them once, at my wedding, it was set to take place at the same church where my female self and I got separated  

there’s no turning back now