Scheherazade
Walks out of her tale
One Thousand and One Time
But cannot
Delay the killing
Of no one
Danger
Is no longer a cynical king
To be spotted easily
Scheherazade has bought
A new car
To drive in highways
With a magical speed, and chase
Aloof individuals, made of freshly made entangled-tales,
And warn them
Today
She feels tired quickly,
-It must be the polluted air-
Parks her car under a withered tree
She hasn’t yet unfastened the seatbelt when
A barefoot boy appears
With a stack of newspapers
The boy holds no Aladdin’s Lamp
And Scheherazade wants
To get him in her car
And return him to his story
So, the ghouls, loose in streets,
Don’t harm him
Tough, all the kid Aladdin wants,
Is to sell his newspapers
Scheherazade, tired of trying
Turns the radio on:
“Killing street-women in Mash’had, 17 and counting..”
Scheherazade is stuck behind the red lights
Murderers escape
One reporter recognizes her,
And follows
Writes a few articles about her One Thousand and One Futile Attempts To Stop the Killings,
and loses her job
–
Freshteh Sari
Translated by Saghi Ghahraman
Toronto 2003