The procession reached the groom’s house, now adorned with expensive furniture, glittering dishes, and fragrant herbs. The couple climbed onto a raised couch, and the guests sat down on silk carpets and velvet chairs, packing the large room. The servants hurried about with wine, and the clink of cups mixed with the happy shouts. Next musicians came and took their places, intoxicating the people with their magical voices and filling hearts with melodies woven on the humming strings of the lute from men’s sighs and the rustling of the tambourine.

Then the girls stood up to dance, their bodies swaying with the music as slender branches sway with the breaths of the breeze. The folds of their soft dresses moved like white clouds touched by moonlight. All eyes were upon them and all heads bent to watch. The spirits of the young men embraced them, and their beauty broke old men’s hearts. Then everyone turned back to ask for more to drink, and their desires were drowned in wine. They grew restless and their voices grew louder. License ruled and dignity disappeared. Brains were addled, souls burned, hearts were restless. The whole house and everything in it became like a guitar, its strings broken and plucked roughly by a demoness, her song wavering between harmony and discord. Here a young man reveals the secrets of his love for a girl, coquettish and proud in her beauty. Over there a youth arranges sweet words and subtle hints in his mind as he prepares to talk to a beautiful girl. A middle-aged man downs cup after cup and repeatedly asks the musicians to play songs that remind him of his youth. In this corner a woman makes eyes at a man, but he looks with love at another. In that corner a woman, her hair white with age, smiles at the girls trying to choose a bride for her only son. Standing by that window a wife whose husband is drunk finds a chance to be with her lover. All are drowned in a sea of wine and flirtation, have surrendered to a flood of exultation and pleasure, have forgotten the events of yesterday, have turned away from the morrow, have devoted themselves to exploiting the present moments.

The beautiful bride stared with unhappy eyes at the scene, a despairing prisoner gazing at her prison’s black walls. Every few moments she would look to one corners of the room. A youth of twenty sat there, alone among the happy people, a wounded bird separate from its flock, his arms folded on his chest as though they kept his heart from flight. He stared at something invisible in the air of the room, as though his essence had departed from his visible body to soar in space with the phantoms of the night.