Dissolving Borders

And Dreaming of Tehran as Israel stokes a sparring war.

Sulaymaniyah, Iraq beyondwildplaces.com

I’ve only seen the rolling rocky hills from the border.

My friend pointed toward the East, there, he told me, that’s Iran. There were border stations on the horizon and mostly just land, gorgeous Earthy-green and brown mountainous and expansive, right in the middle of a high desert heat.

I lingered. We were in Sulaymaniyah, a Kurdish province in NorthEast, Iraq. And there was a road …that might just have taken us to Tehran.

If only I didn’t have an American passport. If only I had a dual citizenship…from somewhere else, almost anywhere else was allowed. In the heated wind, I breathed slow. I dreamt of it.

We only stayed for a few minutes on the way to an interview.

I lingered East from the passenger seat. The country, the people, the Persian history. Magnificent.