Enheduanna: The First Author - Wattys Winner 2021

14. New Eyes

Even after Dingira left, sleep eluded me. With Nanna's moon as my only light, I picked up the broken tablet and put it in a basket. Tomorrow I could ask someone to mould it back together. Tomorrow was also the moment I had to welcome the new moon with a hymn, one that would please Nanna enough to return to the night sky. Involuntarily, my mind went back to the vision I was shone a fortnight ago. The drought, the fire, it all seemed so real. Something told me it was a warning, a sign from Inanna.

With a heavy sigh, I landed upon the other issue that preoccupied my mind. Why had I only seen Ningal and Inanna, but not the god who I was supposed to serve? All the priestesses assumed Nanna showed my visions, but what if they found out that was a lie? What would become of me then?

I couldn't tell anyone the truth either. Kituzda needed little excuse to replace me as high priestess. The lords of Ur hated me because of my blood and even Idal seemed to disapprove of me the way he ran so quickly to Kituzda's defence.

Rolling the reeds through my fingers, I recited Inanna's words, "With this, you have the power to speak inside the heads of millions. Time shall be your servant." With the waning moon, bringing the promise of a dawn soon to come, it felt like time was now my enemy.

"Death will no longer silence you, as long as you write." I said to myself, pressing the reed into the wet clay. My thoughts evaporated as I carved into the clay. It felt like I was crying, but not a single tear fell from my eyes. It was my soul that cried. Connecting the deepest part of my heart to the clay beneath my fingers, reaching for divinity, truth and something else. Something of which I had yet to discover a word to describe it.

After what felt like an eternity, I lay down my reed and placed the tablet in the morning sun to dry. Walking to the window, I looked out wistfully to the waters of the river. Beyond the sandstone walls of Ur I could hear the singing of women, bringing their washings to the river as their children danced around their feet. For a moment I wished I could be out there with them, barefoot and dressed in tatters, with no worry about no god to appease or legacy to uphold.

"Greeting, My Great Lady. I bring you bread and milk." Dingira's sweet voice announced as she placed the tray beside my tablets. "Have you written these?" she wondered, staring wide-eyed at the tablets.

"I have. Please tell me, are they any good?"

Her amber eyes found mine, and with a flick of her slender wrist, she shyly tucked a lock of raven hair behind her ear. "Forgive me, oh Great Lady. I know not how to read. No one has ever thought of me."

"I am sorry to hear that."

Her eyes found mine with the most curious expression. She didn't seem to understand my compassion, her slender brow furrowing at the foreign concept.

"Why would you be 'sorry' about me not knowing something?" Dingira asked.

"Well, writing very liberating. It's like you can memorize moments or even thoughts in clay. Reading those things is like seeing another person's soul. And it saddens me that you have never had that experience before." I said, trying my best not to sound condescending to the poor girl. She must have had a rough life.

To my surprise, she snorted, "I don't need a piece of clay to see another person's soul. My eyes can do that all on their own. And if I wanted other people to hear my thoughts, I speak." Dingira held out the clay tablet to me, "so you can simply tell me what it says."

Her answer both intrigued and surprised me. It was so different from the usual discussions in the most peculiar way. Dingira had her own view of the world and I had mine, yet she didn't make me feel wrong or lesser for having that view. She just explained hers, and somehow I found myself triggered with fascination. "I would like to learn how to read another person's soul. Can you teach me? In exchange, I'll teach you how to read."