apologetic. He broods only about his work now, hiding in his art. He is paint-
ing a huge mural in the lobby of the Ministry of Justice, an elegant abstraction
that will be a nice change from the endless billboards of martyr boys and
tulips. He doesn’t know if anyone will see it, however. If the mullahs don’t
paint it out, he says, the bombs of the next war could destroy the whole build-
ing. Hassan was wrong. The reformers did not come to power, in part because
you invaded Iraq. The old mullahs remain the big dogs.
I received your many messages, Zack, but did not write sooner because I
did not want to think about why I came here. I still do not know. But I am
here. And no matter where you go, there you are. Am I happy? No. Am I
more miserable than I was in Paris or Virginia? No again, strange to say. I am
a woman without a country. I will be a foreigner wherever I go. Why not here?
They say that one writes prose at home and poetry in exile, and I am a poet,
so maybe I will always be in exile.
But I do try to imagine another life. I could live without Abbas. He is so
needy, unable to live alone, but I am stronger. I know how to be alone. Be-
E x i l e s i n A m e r i c a
3 6 9
cause being married to him is like being alone. Who am I kidding? I should
delete those words. I have my children, who are like two extra husbands. I am
not as alone as I pretend. I love Abbas more than he loves me, but I am used
to that. It is the air I breathe, like the thin air of the mountains breathed by the
goats who live in the clouds. And here is money, while in the U.S. I would be
poor.
I am in the land of covered women, and it is not as bad as I feared. I can
be myself indoors, reading illegal books and watching illegal DVDs. I despise
the chador but have grown fond of silk scarfs, particularly on windy days. I
learned early I cannot walk alone without strange men following me and
going tsk tsk tsk. Luckily I have a son and daughter and two sisters-in-law and
even a new friend to accompany me. I am surrounded by people, more than
in Virginia. And yes, I often feel lonely, but I tell myself I should cherish my
loneliness, since it is entirely mine, a free space inside me.
Do you remember Hassan’s idiotic quote from Sartre, how the French
were never so free as they were under the Nazi occupation? It is a stupid idea,
a vile idea. As if a chained dog is freer than a stray, and prison the purest free-
dom of all. Yet I understand the temptation. When we suffer our little private
stories, we long to lose ourselves in a big public story. A public story is more
important, more meaningful. But now I am trapped in a public story (war and
religion), and I miss my private little narratives. Yet they are here, if I look for
them. There will always be little stories. Many little stories in every life at any
given time.
And how are you? What kind of story do you and Daniel live in now? Life
must be wonderfully peaceful without us around. But you appear to miss me
some, since you continue to write despite my silence. I did not think I missed
you, Zack, until I started working on this letter. I like talking to you in my
head as well as face-to-face. We were part of each other’s stories, briefly, dur-
ing our time in America: You and me. Abbas and Daniel. You were our
friends in the Great Satan. But now we live in God. Which is a curious place
to be.
You must come and visit us. One day. When you are ready. Before the next
war. Please?