Series · 32 parts
Novelettes
Short prose by Hadi Pakzad, translated from Persian.
I'm an Engineer
I live in my paternal body, a body I inherited from my family and grew up in. I'm not from anywhere else; my body is the only place I'm allowed to live. Sometimes I look…
Not Walking
Quite by chance I saw a cheetah. Naturally, my first thought was that he would attack me. But when I looked closely I realized he didn't expect me to be afraid of him at…
Letter #3
My dear, toward the end of winter I wasn't doing well, like every year around that time. Sometimes I think that because I was born at the start of winter, near its end a…
Lovesickness
Love isn't a known, discovered disease, but I've heard they're something like worms that start multiplying in the cavities of the brain. And it's not as if there are…
Untitled — “Two Milligrams of Clonazepam”
Two milligrams of clonazepam (benzodiazepine) One milligram of lorazepam (benzodiazepine) Ten milligrams of zolpidem (non-benzodiazepine) It's past four in the morning…
Letter #2
My dear, if you take life itself from someone, they call you a murderer. Maybe you get caught, maybe not; you might not get caught and still regret it, and it's also…
There's Been a Mistake
Looking for a picture frame, I wanted to stop by the old basement of my mother's house, which has long been a storeroom for things no one uses anymore, all the things…
Tampering
For a while I'd been feeling lonely; I wanted a pet. I hate birds, because I know they haven't got much of a brain, and yet they can fly. Who on earth gave something…
Untitled — “Agreement, Fear, Psyche”
1. Agreement: If you're interested in social issues, please don't read the rest of this text, because my piece isn't social at all; the same goes if you're feeling fine…
Let's Say
Let's say you left to bring news, to come to terms with yourself. You took me and tossed me at the edge of your little world, and later and less often than the dishes…
Light Hands
For a lot of people, the first time they see you, your hands matter. They may pretend otherwise; maybe they don't look straight at your hands at all, or they even shake…
Name Them
In the middle of winter I was driving, and since I'd only just gotten into the car, its parts were still cold and even the steering wheel had numbed the skin of my…
Urgency
I had gone to the neighborhood hypermarket to buy a few specific groceries. My dear, you know I don't buy anything for the fridge unless I have to; it puts my mind more…
Untitled — “In a Film an Old Man Said”
In a film an old man said, I don't know why people first went after skin, or when it was. He meant animal skin. I don't know whether it was to keep warm in the cold back…
Untitled — “You Live in a Third-World Country”
You live in a third-world country with nth-rate thoughts. If you're sitting on a bench on the cobblestones along a river that runs through the middle of a city, waiting…
Untitled — “Based on a True Story”
Based on a true story. / Have you ever quit something? / Cigarettes, say, or alcohol, or a person, or even a belief. / For some kinds of quitting there are patches, for…
Untitled — “The Tragedy of Uselessness”
In the literature of life there is a bitter story called the tragedy of uselessness. The neighbor is hammering a nail into the wall, and that wall is the most important…
Don't Become a Dress
The woman I learned love from, unlike most people, who take love to be an exchange and a mutual attraction, believed that love doesn't run in a closed, cycle-like…
Slavery
Years ago I read somewhere that in Iran each person works for eleven people. I have no interest in political or social debates, but let's extend this to people's…
The Wrong Door
1. All of us go on strike sometimes; we shut the door of our house or our room on the world and decide to be by ourselves for a while, and well, for eating and washing…
The Chair
Part one: it's very strange that the more a person has enjoyed anything in life, the more, in exactly that measure, they suffer from its absence. This is one of those…
Chemistry of Love
Chemistry of Love I dedicate this piece to all those who deserved, and still deserve, something better than what has been sold to them in the name of love. Right at the…
Exhausted Engines
Ever since the first time my balloon burst when I was a child, I've never felt good again. Many times I felt better, but good, no. I mean, everyone loves their balloon…
What Is Talking
Apart from the linguistic definition, which is the most general of them and settles for the production of sounds to convey meanings, talking is so vast a subject that…
Untitled — “Just Shut Your Mouth”
Just shut your mouth, don't voice your firm convictions, come a little further with my assumptions. From here, look at what the passersby see of us through the window…
Spy
Spy Honestly, I've worked since I was a kid. Every summer I'd go somewhere to learn a trade. I know repairs, for instance, everything from radios and car stereos to TVs.…
Crocodile
Crocodile You know, crocodiles have a hard time walking on land, so they prefer to sit for long stretches, silent and still, under muddy water. Basically they're…
Good Night
Good Night As a child I never by nature counted dolls among my toys. I had no interest in them at all, neither human dolls nor animals. But my sister, who was older than…
Letter #1
Hello, my dear You had asked me not to tell anyone anything, and just like the toy revolver I stole as a kid from my spoiled cousin, I hid you from everyone. My cousin…
I'm Done
It was a little past sunset, and once again I'd fallen asleep in the light and woken up in the dark on the couch. I tried to turn on the TV without moving, so its noise…
Untitled — “Is Magic an Art Too?”
A friend asked me, is magic an art too? I wanted to say art is magic, then saw that it was a routine, trite answer, and that I don't really know what art is myself. Off…
Short Musings by Hadi Pakzad
• Sleep while you're alive; after death, sleep is no pleasure. • People change; some jerk has already tried his luck. • As the altitude rises you feel pride; higher…