When I reached, its tail was going under the grave too. Aman-Allah gulped down his saliva and while he was out of breath under a pile of hay said, “I saw myself that it was crunching the field keeper Ghorban-Ali and coming here.”

The trail of blood was stretched from the garden and fell into Dasht-Rahan.* It came again and reached the slope of the down graveyard of the Imam-Zadeh* and went up again. Some stones had also fallen down from the stone fence under the wooden fence of the Imam-Zadeh’s balcony, but the trail of the blood was stopped by the grave.

Nobody saw that it swallowed the field keeper Ghorban-Ali in the garden and reached the acclivity down the Imam Shrine.* It wasn’t also clear that it was the blood trail of Ghorban-Ali or the viper, but definitely the field keeper should have attacked him with his scythe and should have beaten it to death times and times, even the viper gulped him down at that moment.

Mashdi* Mousa said, “He gave out a loud shout of death in a way that I ran all the way up to here.”

Bab-Allah with his scythe in his hand reached the shrine’s balcony and looked into the shrine’s yard and said, “Damn to it, how rapid it was.”

Karbalai-Reza went a step back and first had a look at people gathering there and then sat and stretched his finger over the blood that hadn’t congealed yet. Then he looked at the trail stretched on the soiled path of the plain Dasht-Rahan up to the stone fence under the wooden fence of the Imam-Zadeh. He asked, “Is there anybody who saw it crunching the demised Ghorban-Ali?

I answered that when I reached, its tail was also going into the hole. Kablai went forward furthermore on tiptoe to have a look at the yard. He took off his overshoes and came in. When he stroke a match and lighted up the gerdsouz,* the light came into the yard and the shades of the iron icicles took a living over the stucco works of the ceiling, doors and walls. He went round the yard. While he was touching “the green cloth of the grave”* he whispered, “Oh, Imam Esmail! May I be sacrificed in place of your ancestor?* What a mystery is it? اللهم صل علی محمد و آل محمد. اللهم...”*

He kneed slowly and moved the blood still waving, with the tip of his scythe.

- *اللهم صل علی محمد و آل محمد...

When he stood up, he opened his fingers in a way that he could rub the blow of his mouth on his face and head*and left the yard backwards and rapidly. Mirza-Ali said, “There is no need of document, Ghorban-Ali is not here, but there is the trail of the blood.”

The demised Mash* Yaghoub who was still alive that day said, “Now, whose waist has the power to dig the Imam’s grave with shovel and pick?”

Kablai came and said, “Mash Yaghoub, the matter is not digging the grave; first we should see if it was a viper or not.”

I said, “Swear to Koran, I saw myself.”

Golpari who was placing her ewer under the mulberry tree by the mosque’s door said, “I also heard its feshsh… sound.”

- Mash Pashegheh answered from the roof of the mosque, “My sister, that was the sound of the pipes.”

Golpari nagged, “As for these damn pipes they have no pressure.”

A voice came from the yard that said, "Why did you get together?”

It was Sheikh* Fatemeh. Standing cowered in the framework of her house door in the yard and her looked remained astonished at the people gathering there. She continued, “Are raisins and sugarplums handed out?”*

She started coming forward slowly. Her dark thin feet came out of her green sandals with every step and she then put her fingers into them again.

I said, “It went in from here.”

She nagged, “He goes to the city and speaks Chal-Tehrani for me.”*

I said, “The blood is left.”

Mash Yaghoub poured the ash of his calumet down the stone fence and went forward furthermore. He had a look at Bab-Allah who was under his hay on his back. Then he had a look at Kablai.

Kablai said, “What a mystery is it? As for me I can’t make a head or tail of it?”

Sheikh Fatemeh asked again, “Ok, what happened?”

Mash Yaghoub answered, “The field keeper…” Then he said louder, “It crunched the demised Ghorban-Ali and then it came here.”

- Well, now what do you want?

I said, “It is not clear where he is now.”

- Certainly it has been the miracle of the Imam.

Kablai said, “Well, what was the sin of Ghorban-Ali?”

Sheikh Fatemeh went towards the yard of the shrine and answered just right there, “There are some things that you and me don’t know about them.”

At that time, the driver and then Goudarz and Sorm-Ali came in from the shrine’s gate.

The driver asked, “Nobody comes to Ghazvin?”

He meant me. His Simorgh* was going fiercely to the town empty.

He got no answer from me, then he faced the gathering and said, “was it clear where it took him or not?”

Nobody answered.

He said, “If we have apparatus-mapparatus* we can find him.”

Then he looked at me.

Sorm-Ali said, “My friends have this apparatus in Ghazvin.”

Goudarz asked, “As for the apparatus it just shows the antiques-mantiques.”*

The driver said, “Well boy, and the dragon sits on the antiques either.”

I said but it was a viper!?

He said, “No matter viper or dragon. Each treasure has its own spell.”

Sorm-Ali smiled with shy and Goudarz said while laughing, “So the apparatus is on me guy.”

Sheikh Fatemeh came out of the yard and said, “Just one thing is left and that is to go into the Imam’s grave with shovel and pick!

Then she bolted the door and continued, “Go, go, go and take a running jump.”*

The driver said, “Sheikh Fatemeh, we have nothing to do with the Imam shrine. We just want to bring out Mash Ghorban-Ali.

Mash Yaghoub answered, “What is the use of it? If he had had one hundred lives, they would have been claimed by the viper.”

Sorm-Ali said, “At least let’s bury him respectfully.”

Golpari said from the top, “Good, good, first it was the mashing sound at night that we couldn’t find who made it and what it was for and now this.

The driver said angrily, “Arsalan’s wife, what do you say? Why do you interfere in men’s job? A man is died.”

Golpari said, “Now that Milak has no owner”…she laughed and continued, “Let us be buried within an Imam’s body at least rather than to be eaten by Yeleng-Meleng and Kaftal Pari.*

The driver, Goudarz and Sorm-Ali were whispering until they got into the Simorgh.  

The demised Mash Yaghoub and Kablai both were going that Kablai said, “He had such a loud cry of death that I thought Milak caught fire.

Sheikh Fatemeh said aloud, “الفاتحه مع الصلوات”*

Footnote

 

Dasht-Rahan: is the name of a plain but in meaning word by word “plain path”

Imam-Zadeh: the shrine of a person or a person who is counted as one of the twelve Shiite Imams’ descendants

Imam Shrine: a holy place where an Imam is buried in there and people go there for paying pilgrimage

Mash or Mashdi: a person who goes to the Mashhad city of Iran for paying pilgrimage to the holy Imam Reza, the 8^th Imam of Shiite (nearly dated)

gerdsouz: oil light

the green cloth of the grave: a special green cloth which is brought from the holy Mashhad by pilgrims to be given to the others as a present of good luck

May I be sacrificed in place of your ancestor: people might use this expression when they talk to the holy figures like Imam Reza

اللهم صل علی محمد و آل محمد: it is an Arabic verse which here is read as a kind of prayer – it means “greeting to the Prophet Mohammad and his descendants”

he could rub the blow of his mouth on his face and head: when people visit the holy shrine of an Imam they blow into their hands and rub it on his face and head as a sign of good luck and health for them (people usually used to do it in the past)

Sheikh: the woman who takes the charge of handling the cleaning tasks which are concerned with an Imam Shrine  

Are raisins and sugarplums handed out: this idiom might be expressed by someone when he or she wants to know why people gather together in somewhere

He goes to the city and speaks Chal-Tehrani for me: the rural people use this expression as an irony when they see a village dweller can speak with pure Tehrani accent (Tehran is the capital of Iran)

Simorgh: it is the trademark of a car from the Nissan Company that in word means phoenix

apparatus-mapparatus: It is a sort of language that people use in Iran when they want to point out something. They repeat the word with another letter in the beginning but it means the same thing. It denotes in here an apparatus or something like that.  

antiques-mantiques: It is a sort of language that people use in Iran when they want to point out something. They repeat the word with another letter in the beginning but it means the same thing. It denotes in here an antique or something like that.  

Yeleng (one-leg): The word ye-leng is the same yek-leng in Persian. “Yek” means “one” and “leng” means “leg”. It is one of the imaginary creatures in Milak fables with one eye and one leg that loves women.

Yeleng-Meleng: It is a sort of language that people use in Iran when they want to point out something. They repeat the word with another letter in the beginning but it means the same thing. It denotes in here Yeleng or something like that.  

Kaftal Pari:It is one of the imaginary creatures in Milak fables that has the cry of a very old woman. Pari in word is fairy.

الفاتحه مع الصلوات: say fateheh and salavat.

fateheh: it is an Arabic word (فاتحه) – people say this Arabic verse to wish happiness for the soul of a dead person  

salavat: it is an Arabic word ( (صلواتthat means greeting in English, but the greeting is specific to the Prophet Mohammad and his descendants. In practicing, as a tradition someone says aloud "صلوات" and in following the other people answer

" اللهم صل علی محمد و آل محمد" – it means “greeting to the Prophet Mohammad and his descendants”

Writer: Yousef Alikhani

Translator: Mandana Davarkia