ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

PASHA ENTERS

PASHA (over a cell phone): I’ve long held this opinion to be true, for the upright Shiia, and the best of the Sunni, the disposition of the new constitution should be wholly given over to the people, whatever the difficulties, the hearsay about sects. If only the radical clerics had such a regard for all our kin, that we might live at peace, at least this tenth day of Muharram.

(HANAN ENTERS.)

HANAN: Are we alone?

PASHA: Yes. (Over his phone.) Hanan just got here. She wondered if we’re alone. I wish I could get my cameraman and Mohammed back. Half the bureau’s out visiting the Coalition officials to get them released.

HANAN (softly): Is that Karbala? How is Jamil?

PASHA (to HANAN): He’ll live. He’s weary, and it could be a long and hard recovery. (Over the phone.) We can’t turn back now. Yes, I saw the BBC reporters on the roof top near the Hussein mosque. That’s where matters tend. I’ll check the video. Thanks for the links. I’ve got an evening broadcast to write up, I mean edit, and our announcer, none better,

hasn’t made it back from Kadimiyah. I hope he’s not stuck in traffic. Thank you, Sayyid. (Turns off the cell phone.) Look, now!

HANAN: What?

PASHA: If I’ve lost my announcer, could I ask you to read the news on the air tonight?

HANAN: Dressed like this?

PASHA: We have some wardrobe for a woman.

HANAN: Yes, I can do it. Do you think Hazem has gotten himself lost?

PASHA: His satellite phone is down. I don’t know if he’s been detained, or his car broke down, or what.

HANAN: I came in to say that Mr. Al-Juburi and his daughter and Ali just arrived.

PASHA (looking down a corridor): That good man. While he’s standing by the portal, I must tell you, Hanan, it is all I can do to keep my reporters under my wing. If not Saddam, or the bombing last April, now the chaos in the land could slay us all.

HASSAN: Khalil told me just now that he hoped to find an escape, freedom from the chaos today, at the shrine. He’s heartbroken he couldn’t proceed there this morning.

PASHA: He looked exhausted when we left the Square.

HANAN: He said that inside the shrine there are no exiles from the war on terrorism, no detainees, no tribal clashes. "From there," he said, "we can never be forced to roam."

PASHA: Already begun your interview.

(KHALIL, NOOR, and ALI ENTER.)

KHALIL: With all the pilgrims today, and this last week, I thought it fit to come and tell you of my exile and return, to let my heart become settled again.

PASHA: I am glad to see you all again. Hello, Ali. Noor. Thank you for bringing your father.

ALI: Hello, Mister.

NOOR: Mister Baqir.

ALI: Mister Baqir.

KHALIL: We won’t be driven to war, Sunni against Shiia.

PASHA: No.

KHALIL: The CPA was telling us today to be calm after the bombings. Bremer telling us, from thither and yon, sent as a herald by the tribune-seeking Texan, demanding we surrender the right to choose Islam to guide Iraq. The ayatollahs want the Coalition driven from Iraq now. They say we can live in peace after this. This will only unite us and make us stronger.

HANAN: What do you think of the threat of a lingering presence, one hundred thousand Americans in and out, rotating friend and foe?

KHALIL: Yes. Fresh recruits. They’ll have our summer heat, and Baghdad no meal city. These children, coming into the courtyards of the mosques, have you noticed how many of them look like exiles in their own land?

PASHA: I have.

NOOR: Yes, father, we have seen them. (To PASHA.) What has become of Hassan and Mohammed?

PASHA: I was almost frantic about it. They weren’t allowed to call anyone. That would be the story, if it weren’t for the suicide bombings today.

KHALIL: Yes. You would like a story. I can be your guide. You must also speak with Noor and her husband, though. They have the story. The story of what happened to Ali.

PASHA: The boy looks well.

KHALIL: Miraculously well.

NOOR: He had been kidnapped and released in October. My care is now centered on my boy and my father. My mother Inas died during the bombing last April, from fright I believe, and lack of medical care.

PASHA: Your mother was still living in Iraq during the war.

KHALIL: I went into exile alone. Inas was much younger than me. Noor was just a child then. Her parents provided for Noor and my son while I was gone.

NOOR: You sent us money. Often. The doctors said their clinic had been looted. It was too late. Mother passed away on a hospital bed in a coma.

PASHA (to KHALIL): You want your grandson to see the shrine as a boy.

KHALIL: One day’s delay could be too long. Eighty-one years old and still I have never been to the shrine of Musa al-Kazim and Mohammed al-Jawad. I would not shrink from doing what my grandfather asked, and when I gave him my word, so many years ago, before the crowds had massed on either side of this sectarian warfare, I knew I would someday stand a suppliant to Allah inside that holy place, during Muharram, and tender boy that I was, I thought all Muslims - Sunni and Shiia - were like brethren. When I learned how we seek refuge from one another, driving one tribe by force from the land, and then children, oh children, coming against their fathers’ enemies, I knew I could be persecuted if I wandered onto that spot.

HANAN: There is no curse. Mohammed the prophet sent us all here.

KHALIL: And the same Master. Many a year I wavered and put this off. But at the behest of my grandfather, doubtless in a good position at my age to be free from trouble, I hoped to enter there today at last. Tomorrow, Noor plans to take me there, and Haider as well.

(Phone rings.)

PASHA (over his cell phone): Yes. When? I’m elated. (To the others.) Hassan and Mohammed have been released unharmed.

HANAN: That’s wonderful.

PASHA (over the phone): Why haven’t they called? Oh. Their phones were confiscated. (To the others.) To check if they can be traced to terrorists’ calls.

HANAN: Oh, how awful of the Americans.

KHALIL: Oh, let this be a land of freedom.

(COLLEEN and AMINAH ENTER.)

NOOR: I am so glad for your men. (To HANAN.) Is there a place where I can wait with Ali while you make the recording?

PASHA (to NOOR): We have a nursery for the children of employees.

HANAN: I can take you to it. It’s just down the corridor. If we’re all ready then.

KHALIL: Yes. Come, Ali. Grandfather is going to talk with this young reporter about Iraq.

ALI: I can listen to it on the television.

HANAN: Yes. And on the radio. (To PASHA.) Thank you.

PASHA: Take your time. This is an important story.

HANAN (to COLLEEN and AMINAH): Good afternoon. This is Pasha’s office. We are just going to the recording studio.

PASHA (to COLLEEN and AMINAH): Come in, ladies. Thank you, Mr. Al-Juburi. And Mrs. Al-Azzawi.

NOOR: Thank you, sir. Come along, Ali. Good day to you, Colleen. Aminah.

AMINAH: Your father is looking better.

KHALIL: Thank you. I feel better now.

(HANAN, KHALIL, NOOR, and ALI EXIT.)

PASHA: Three days of mourning.

AMINAH: Yes, we heard. It’s delayed the signing of the constitution.

PASHA: Iraq has been thrown by this. But not to the ground, as the terrorists thought. I think your country has been thrown in the air.

AMINAH: Yes. It’s all caught up in an envelope of sorts, a book of raids.

PASHA: How do you mean?

AMINAH: It’s like it is written now. By the hand of God. Iraq has shown today it will not be broken.

PASHA: Yes, you are so right.

COLLEEN: You have a nice location. So near the market-place.

PASHA: We’ve had the Americans or the Council tell us, "Get out!" twice. I hope we won’t be forced away again.

COLLEEN: I hope not too.

AMINAH: Khalil looks so aged. Rested from this morning, but aged.

PASHA: Thirty years of exile. He’s giving Hanan quite a story for such a young woman. And with all the trouble, the lack of security, especially for young women in Iraq, you know she hopes for a scholarship so she can study abroad.

COLLEEN: She told us. She’s told us of threats from some radical Muslim men when she’s entered Baghdad University not wearing the hijab on her way to classes.

PASHA: Yes. I’ve talked with women who’ve been accosted there.

COLLEEN: Young men in masks who stand near the outskirts of the university challenging women coming on campus to go back if their heads aren’t covered. I know women so scared they just want out of the country. For many, it’s not getting any better.

AMINAH: Not just on the outskirts. Right by the lectures buildings, and even inside some of the halls.

COLLEEN: How can the Americans allow such mistreatment of women here? The extremists told one female student that she was flouting Islam, to be out without a head cover, that she’s a bad woman.

PASHA: Yes, and I’ve heard this from a young woman who works with the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps. They say she’s doing a man’s job.

COLLEEN: You are rather brave to employ Hanan.

PASHA: Our network does not discriminate against any group, nor encourage violence or oppression of any people or minority.

COLLEEN: Can you tell us anything about the case of the President of the Iraqi Women’s Federation? There have been threats from radical fundamentalists that she stop her journalistic work.

PASHA: I know her. She’s sat right there where you are and we’ve discussed it.

COLLEEN: You’ve published some of her articles.

PASHA: I have. And it’s all the more troubling that there are thousands of Iraqi intellectuals – professors, writers, and other journalists – who have been threatened with death for being advocates for civil liberties and independent thinking in Iraq.

COLLEEN: Have you received any death threats?

PASHA: I have. And I am sorry for those who have been the target of assassinations such as last summer, when Dr. Bushra al-Rawi, the President of Baghdad University, was killed.

AMINAH: Yes. I heard him speak once, when he visited Chicago and spoke at an Arab-American conference.

PASHA: I thought of just giving up and leaving Iraq after his death. But then I realized he would have wanted all of us to stand up and be the voice of the Iraqi independents.

COLLEEN: Yes. What will be your headline for today’s tragedy?

PASHA: It’s already online. "Shiia Holy Day Turns Deadly"

AMINAH: What are the latest details?

PASHA: It’s the worst day of bloodshed in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi authorities put the number of dead at well over two hundred. The Americans have the death toll at one hundred forty-three at the least. The suicide attacks were synchronized, designed to inflict maximum casualties.

AMINAH: And inflame sectarian tensions.

PASHA: Some of the bombs were packed with ball bearings.

COLLEEN: Oooh!

PASHA: At close quarters, inside the shrine, that wreaks havoc. There’s a police captain in Karbala quoted as saying, ""How can you combat one person who wants to blow himself up among thousands of people?"

AMINAH: And today around ten a.m. while we were at the Freedom Monument.

PASHA: Yes. It’s believed there were three suicide bombers. The shrine was packed with worshippers, and they just blended into the crowd. They had on vests laden with explosives. Shrapnel everywhere. Blew a huge door off its hinges.

COLLEEN: How ghastly.

PASHA: One of the saddest images, my announcer and some other reporters with the network saw it immediately after the attacks.

AMINAH: What?

PASHA: The bloodied shoes that had been stored on shelves at the entrance to the prayer area.

AMINAH: Oh.

COLLEEN: Oh how sad.

PASHA: The keepers of the shoes were killed.

AMINAH: And so many women and children killed.

PASHA: I’ve just about despaired thinking of it all day.

COLLEEN: I saw film earlier this afternoon that your other cameraman shot there as the militia tried to restore calm. The men in black beating their heads and chests in mourning.

PASHA: Yes. And they did capture a fourth attacker whose bomb didn’t explode.

COLLEEN: Before he could do any harm. Thank God for that.

PASHA: Oh, but he managed to throw some grenades at the pilgrims, who were already panicked. But then he was subdued.

AMINAH: And in Karbala?

PASHA: Our reporters have it that there the attackers used a combination of methods: a suicide bombing, and remote controlled devices, and mortars fired from near the outskirts of town, but that last part is being downplayed.

We have so many mortar rounds fired all over Iraq these days.

COLLEEN: What about the one bomber in Karbala?

PASHA: They got a good look at him. I can tell you this much. He had a beard and was dressed in a black outfit similar to that of the pilgrims and waded into a group of men who were chanting. Then the streets were filled with stampeding crowds who ran headlong into new explosions.

AMINAH: Who do you think is responsible?

PASHA: It could be al-Qaida. The suspects who were caught in Karbala include some Iranians.

COLLEEN: And Basra. There were attacks foiled in Basra and Najaf.

PASHA: Yes.

(An intercom rings.)

PASHA (answering): Hello. (Standing.) Excellent. Send them up. Thank you. (Hangs up.) Hassan and Mohammed are down in the lobby. That was the receptionist. They were brought here by an taxi driver who didn’t have a phone.

COLLEEN: I’m glad they’re safe.

AMINAH: You must be relieved.

PASHA: Yes, only there’s no telling when the Americans will show up again.

COLLEEN (looking at AMINAH): Do you think it could be a set-up?

AMINAH: How so?

PASHA: Yes. I’m so glad they’ve been released. (To COLLEEN.) Do you mean there could be an ulterior motive to their release?

COLLEEN: It’s all so unfathomable what my country is doing here.

(HASSAN and MOHAMMED ENTER.)

PASHA: Here they are. (Embracing HASSAN and MOHAMMED.) Are you all right?

HASSAN: I suppose so. I didn’t like the holding cell. I couldn’t find anyplace to sit down. And they put a bright lamp in front of my face while they interrogated me. I think it burned the retina of my eyes.

COLLEEN: How awful.

MOHAMMED: They had us in different areas. I don’t know why they were lenient with me. They questioned me half an hour, stuck me in with some other men – mostly robbers and kidnappers – and ordered us out into the hall.

PASHA (to HASSAN): And you have your camera!

HASSAN: Yes, but they took the film I shot at Liberation Square.

PASHA: We can try to get it back. Did they return to you all your things? Your wallet?

MOHAMMED: Yes.

HASSAN: Except our phones.

MOHAMMED: And my phone has a log of all the incoming calls for the last two weeks, a stored memory of everyone on my list. Names, even addresses. I know they’ll use it to try to hurt my contacts. That captain Karl was there, part of the interrogation. He accused me of having ties with terrorists.

PASHA: I’m sorry. Did they mistreat you?

MOHAMMED: No, but what they did to Hassan is torture. I’m sorry, Hassan.

HASSAN: I know it was torture. I thought I’d go blind.

COLLEEN: How awful.

HASSAN: Why do those strangers from America come here and act like we’re all confederates with al-Qaida? I wish we could sweep them out to sea, across the deserts into Saudi Arabia.

MOHAMMED: I think we were being tracked here.

PASHA: By whom?

MOHAMMED: American operatives. Non-military. I’ve seen their hand in this sort of thing before and heard about it from detainees.

PASHA: Then we mustn’t neglect to stay clear of trouble.

COLLEEN: May I be so bold as to say, out of regard for your country’s freedom, that instead of dragging Iraqis into prison by the thousands, American soldiers should do more to protect the altars in the mosques and shrines.

MOHAMMED: Thank you, yes. Every smart aleck American private, girls and boys, act like the monarch of the land when they arrive here.

PASHA (looking out the window): Oh, no! Here he comes in person, hot, hateful, like all the American soldiers out to ruin us.

COLLEEN (also looking out the window): It’s that captain.

AMINAH: Why? This is getting really scary.

PASHA: He won’t want to hear what I have to say.

COLLEEN (looking outside): He’s got a retinue of ten armed soldiers with him.

HASSAN (looking outside): Younger men. Why do they act like they’re coming to the rescue, making those war hoops like some football team?

PASHA (looking outside): They’re forming some sort of wreath around the door. Oh. To prevent me from escaping, no doubt.

AMINAH: I could cry.

(Intercom rings.)

PASHA (answering phone): Yes, Salma. No, I have people in my office. I think I’d better come down there. (To the others.) I’ve got to tend to this. Please, stay here.

HASSAN: I can come with you.

PASHA: I’d rather you stay, Hassan. I think they’re trying to provoke us. To get some grounds to arrest us. I’ll be right back. I hope. Unless they’re here to arrest me.

HASSAN: The pain in my eyes from that bright lamp. I could almost cry.

COLLEEN: This captain will cause an uproar.

MOHAMMED: Last year, they dragged one of our reporters forcibly out onto the street, when he resisted, just protested that they had the wrong man. The American soldiers hurled him down on the ground. Bruised him pretty badly. My tears flowed then. But not now.

HASSAN: Dressed in combat armor. Betrays the barbarian side of the Coalition. Never know from which country they come now either, Spain, Honduras, Poland, Italy. They should at least dress like us.

COLLEEN: White robes would be more comfortable.

AMINAH: Oh, I wonder who sent that captain. And why?

MOHAMMED: If they were only free to tell. None in the U.S. military ever tells us. They expect us to tell them everything, or else.

HASSAN: I’ve got more film. There was plenty in this cabinet. Pasha has always said, "never have an empty camera." And this one cost thousands.

I’m ready for plenty of speech and action.

MOHAMMED: Perhaps we’ll have grounds to file a lawsuit.

COLLEEN: If only we all could.

MOHAMMED: Baghdad is my native city. I think Mr. Al-Juburi is also from Baghdad. They will not make me run away with their doom of death.

HASSAN: And we have right.

AMINAH: If only the pilgrims could rule Baghdad.

COLLEEN: Independently.

(PASHA and KARL heard offstage.)

COLLEEN: They’re arguing.

PASHA (offstage): We’re not protesting. My office is down this hall.

KARL (offstage): I have a search warrant. Just show me your computer.

MOHAMMED: Oh, no. They’ll destroy the hard drive like they did last time.

HASSAN: I’m going to take a stand and keep filming.

(PASHA, KARL, and SIMON ENTER.)

HASSAN: Him.

KARL: No one venture to bring harm upon himself, or herself, or it will be of their own getting.

AMINAH: Good afternoon, captain. This was a peaceful gathering.

KARL: I’ve come here because military intelligence perceived some internet chatter, and electronic monitoring, coming from the news bureau, that they believe could be terrorist linked.

PASHA: Not possible.

KARL: Not possible?

PASHA: In my perplexity, I meant, I have no knowledge of any such activity here at the bureau.

KARL (looking at Pasha’s computer): State-of-the-art. (To PASHA.) You’re staking it all on one risky throw, to win or lose. Don’t. (Noticing HASSAN filming.) You again. (To HASSAN.) If you still have your senses, and only you are to blame, put down that camera.

COLLEEN: I can hardly catch my breath.

KARL: Sorry about these foolish troubles, ladies. (To HASSAN.) I gave you an order.

HASSAN: What? This is our network headquarters in Iraq. Can’t I film here?

KARL: Argument against argument. Stop filming.

(HASSAN continues filming.)

KARL: What will be your gain?

PASHA (to KARL): Suppose you admit he has the right to film here.

KARL (to SIMON): Shall we take them away?

PASHA (to KARL): You have a far-reaching arm and the Coalition's might. Complete your filming Hassan and turn it off.

(KHALIL and HANAN ENTER.)

KARL (preoccupied with the computer): Now listen. No pleading. The matter could result in a trial – yours. Don’t struggle. (To SIMON.) We’ll need boxes. No. We just need the computer hard drive. (To PASHA.) We’ll leave you the monitor and all this, this printer, and your scanner. What’s this?

PASHA: That’s my backup. Those are backup disks of all my files.

KARL: So you can restore all the hard drive if you wish.

PASHA: Yes.

KARL: Then I’m taking this as well. (Noticing KHALIL and HANAN.) Now you two go back.

KHALIL: I’m already wearied. I wanted to rest. The day has been long and hard.

KARL: Turn back and down the hall.

COLLEEN (aside to AMINAH): Unless they die?

KHALIL: I walk closer to Allah. I am tending that way.

HANAN: I’ll follow you back to your daughter.

KARL: Is his family here?

HANAN: His daughter and grandson. You saw them today at the Freedom Monument.

KHALIL: My grandfather once wrote a verse:

How much better than to be

With souls who delight in the words of Allah.

Nothing dearer than to teach

Good friends singing softly the truth.

Look now, this is the love

Of one who has lost a throne

And a realm,

But is happy in righteousness

To abide in God until the end.

PASHA (to KARL): I’d like a receipt.

KARL: For your backup files?

PASHA: It would help.

KARL: You’ll have them back.

PASHA: You’ll return all of them?

KARL: Surely.

PASHA: Erased? Like the last time?

KARL: No escaping that.

KARL (to SIMON): Restrain the cameraman if he doesn’t stop making a recording of this.

SIMON (raising his rifle at HASSAN): You heard the captain. This an order. Lower your camera.

HASSAN: Going to knock me unconscious.

PASHA: Stop, Hassan. There are women here. We don’t want anyone hurt.

SIMON: You heard. These famous words. Stop or I’ll shoot.

(KHALIL walks between HASSAN and SIMON.)

KHALIL (standing facing SIMON): Peace. Constant peace.

COLLEEN: Please don’t shoot him!

(SIMON lowers his rifle.)

HANAN: (shrieking mildly): Mr. Al-Juburi. No.

PASHA (to KARL): By all that lives, don’t let your corporal hurt him.

(HASSAN lowers his camera.)

KHALIL (to SIMON): In earth, air, sea, great, small, below, above - peace. You are among the compassionate of heart.

KARL (to HASSAN): I’ll take your camera.

(HASSAN hands KARL the camera.)

KARL: And I can carry this. (To SIMON.) You can grab that computer. I’ve got it disconnected.

PASHA: You forgot one cable. Just a moment, please, or you’ll have my desk in chaos. There.

SIMON: Thank you. (Takes the computer under one arm, his rifle in the other.)

KHALIL: It is the will of Allah.

PASHA: One request.

KARL: I’m not leaving your disks.

PASHA: Have all your men sign the guest book in the lobby.

KARL: You’re kidding.

PASHA: No kidding.

KARL: Come on, corporal.

PASHA: We like to know who’s visited our office.

KARL: I’m set to go as far as to the end with you.

PASHA: If you will.

KARL (to PASHA): Karl Anderson. Sign in for me, Mr. Baqir. My hands are full. You’ll get a receipt via the mail for your equipment.

(KARL and SIMON EXIT.)

COLLEEN: You can rely on it; my congressman will hear of this. And the public. We have a web site.

PASHA: Sweet friend. (Takes a tape recorder out from under some papers on his desk.) I have it all on tape. Audio cassette.

MOHAMMED: Oh. I didn’t see that.

PASHA: Neither did the captain. I am pleased. It’s running. And the volume was turned up high. Here. (Plays back a second of KARL’s voice.)

MOHAMMED: Never were words better recorded.

HASSAN: Nor replayed.

KHALIL (to PASHA): Seldom have I heard a man speak better than you to that captain. (To HASSAN.) Never a truer man stood his ground.

HASSAN (hugging KHALIL): I think you saved my life.

COLLEEN: I think so too.

HASSAN: That corporal was about to blow off my head.

KHALIL: I asked Allah for a gift, once again, after so many sons and daughters born of the body of Iraq were lost today. I asked me, when I saw you would continue with your line, your filming, "Grant this, kind Allah, I ask you to save this young man’s life." "I grant it," Allah answered.

HASSAN (to KHALIL): The years that have been given you.

KHALIL: Years in the paths of peace. At meeting or parting, whatever the long access of pain or sorrow, when the years are of peace and virtue, always the good remain.

HANAN: I must get Noor and Ali. I hope they weren’t too frightened in the nursery. (EXITS.)

AMINAH: Yes. They must have heard the commotion.

KHALIL: Ali? I feel impelled. (Slumping into a chair.) Is the earth itself upheld?

COLLEEN (to KHALIL): Are you feeling dizzy?

KHALIL: Yes. Allah protect my heart. Of all which live or shall live, shield the noble spirits upon the hills and fields while any of their like survive.

PASHA: We can take you to the emergency room at Yarmouk Hospital. It’s the closest.

KHALIL: No.

COLLEEN: But they have means to keep you alive, if you’ve had a heart attack.

HASSAN: It is from standing up to that corporal.

KHALIL (to HASSAN): This will never be lost or wasted, this day. Against the right, and against the mercy of the shrines, men conspired to kill those without protection – at Karbala and Kadimiyah. Never against a mercy. I stood. It was granted, not by that corporal, but by Allah.

HASSAN: Without which I would be dead.

(HANAN, NOOR, and ALI ENTER.)

NOOR: Father. We saw the army trucks on the street. Ali was such a good boy. Hanan told me what you did.

ALI: To whom did you promise, grandfather?

PASHA: What?

KHALIL: To my grandfather.

NOOR: Give me that phone, please. We must call an ambulance.

KHALIL: No. This is the gift of gifts, to be with those I love. I do not want to be in that hospital, where so many of the wounded from today’s bombings are suffering. They need all the help. But I so wanted to make my free word good.

PASHA: We must still call a doctor.

MOHAMMED: I’ll do that. I’ll use the phone at your secretary’s desk.

(EXITS.)

KHALIL: Oh, to give me Inas alive once more. Could you loosen my collar?

NOOR: There.

KHALIL (to PASHA and HASSAN): You have been in the shrine of the two imams.

PASHA: I have, yes.

HASSAN: And yesterday. I was there.

KHALIL: Side by side with you, Ali.

HASSAN: Saved by you.

KHALIL: In peace, many long years. Could you take me inside the Kadimiyah shrine?

PASHA: Yes.

KHALIL: Could you tell me what it looks like inside?

PASHA: From afar, along Imam Musa bin Kazim Street, you can see the brilliant gold of the two domes. When you walk up to the exterior of the shrine of the immortals, there is a huge mural painted of our Shiia leaders.

KHALIL: I have seen photographs of it. And then?

HASSAN: The four minarets stand perfectly straight like guardians inside the great courtyards.

KHALIL: What do you see when you enter the courtyards?

HASSAN: The crowds. Men and women milling about, kneeling on the tiles. There are two huge courtyards on either side of the tombs.

PASHA: Then you walk through a colonnade with pillars that opens to the inner courtyard surrounding the tombs.

HASSAN: You see five beautiful archways that open the way into the shrine itself. The mosque is adjoining. There are four smaller minarets at either corner of the shrine. The tilework is intricate. The tiles on the walls.

KHALIL: What do you first see when you walk through one of the five archways?

HASSAN: The tombs of the imams.

KHALIL: Peace unto them both. (Slumps over dead.)

NOOR: Father!

ALI: Grandfather.

Copyright 2004 by David Lawrence Cade

All rights reserved