Waxing Cresent

Yesterday was nine Septembers after 11 September 2001. So many wide brush strokes and little painted details of my life have changed since then. And what have those nine Septembers meant for people in Iraq? It was also Saturday, a weekend. Four friends and I drove into the countryside. We climbed a mountainside up to a cave where some things happened, once, a long time ago, although I was unclear what, because so much was only in Arabic. And then, after those things happened, they were written down in the, um, the Bible, apparently. But I don’t know which chapters or what verses. There was candle wax covering the mountainside and the interior of the cave. Christian pilgrims burn small flames in prayer or praise or remembrance. Driving home in the gloaming the sun was a perfect red ball beneath the rising moon, a sliver for the Jewish New Year, a new moon to commemorate the finish of the Muslim month of fasting and the second day of Eid.