Winter 2006

Rare Water, Thunder and Figs

An Iranian Journey
Tehran, Iran

Email Story

IT IS THE HIGH ARC of the Alborz Mountain that makes the sunrise in Tehran so unusual. Each morning the mountain, the white birch trees, the park fountains, the mosques, and the towering sand-colored buildings glow rose and turquoise, nearly lavender, persimmon, and creamy gold. Moving across town in a taxi, the driver offers me his own cup of tea as ta’arof, or a polite custom. His generosity is as intense as the tinted light — in a city of more than twelve million.

To gain perspective on the city, I go hiking on Darakeh, a popular mountain slope. At the trail’s edge, boys sell bowls of sour cherries, and a man, whom I’m told is a mystic, sells hand-spun scarves that still smell of pomegranate juice and walnut oil dye. A lone donkey, saddled with a sack of rice, wanders effortlessly up the steep terrain. The landscape changes — rock cliffs rise into a forest; the forest drops shadows on the river, lending its patchy shade to schoolgirls unpacking a picnic lunch. Open-air restaurants and tea houses rise along the water. Sitting on a carpeted tea-bed called a takht, a woman sips from a bowl of hot lentil soup.

As the sun begins to set, pedestrians offer bowls of saffron rice pudding through the windows of white Peugeots. It’s Ramadan and each dessert carries a prophet’s name scripted neatly in cinnamon. I am not sure which is more striking — the gentle, glinting light of morning, which carries itself with the barest of hands, or the vivid and outstretched light of evening.

TEA GLASSES ON SILVER TRAYS line the dashboard of the bus as it begins its southern departure for the city of Isfahan.With its 1,650-yard shopping avenue dating back to the eleventh century, Isfahan is home to one of the longest vaulted bazaar streets in the world.

Chehelsotoon, meaning forty pillars, is the name of a nearby fountain plaza surrounded by twenty pillars and twenty corresponding reflections.

Today the city is hosting a book festival. A family of four maneuvers through the traffic on a single moped, the woman’s black chador gusting out over the back of the bike. I watch them pass, watch them cross the Si-o-Seh bridge, and imagine their shadows weaving in and out of its thirty-three arches, and then I watch the Zayandeh river. At the foot of another bridge sits an old fashioned café where I rent a water pipe, or ghalyoon, and drink a pot of black tea.

I VISIT THE LOCAL BAZAAR IN SHIRAZ, wandering through its winding aisles filled with spices, handsewn cloth, fresh fruit, hammered copper, mirror mosaics, and antique carpets. I visit the winged bulls at Persepolis, conceived approximately 2,500 years ago by Darius the Great in what was once the heart of ancient Persia. I cannot help but notice the presence of an old landscape, a voice that is larger and wiser and that will be in existence long after its tales have been told.

In the evening I watch families reading poems by the tomb of Hafiz and Sa’di. The inscription on the tomb of Hafiz reads: When thou passest by the head of this tomb, invoke a blessing. For this is a place of pilgrimage for all the libertines of the world. A reed flute sings as we walk through the irrigated rose gardens and gather in the teahouse. The wind snaps and howls, topples clay pots, and whoops high in the trees just before taking out the lights. Moments beget moments: a still moment is surrounded by a moment of stillness. And all of it, all of us, surrounded by pomegranate groves.

With a B.A. in English, Caroline Morrell earned an M.F.A. in poetry and is pursuing a Ph.D. in literature and creative writing. She writes and resides in Milwaukee,Wisconsin.