Cover -- About the Author -- Also by Ali Alizadeh -- Title Page -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Table of Contents -- Marco Polo -- Aged -- The White Room -- Culture and Its Terrors -- The Suspect -- Listening to Michael Jackson in Tehran -- The History of the Veil -- Shut Up -- Us & Them -- The Chariot -- A Familial Renaissance -- The Letters I Won't Write -- Exile and Entropy -- Language(s) -- Dubai -- Rich Eating -- Americans -- The Heater -- Our Democracy -- Now -- Joan of Arc -- Politkovskaya -- Attar -- Robespierre -- March to War -- Spiritus Mundi -- The Guns of Northcote -- The Volunteer -- Seduction -- Sufi's Remonstrance -- 'Feast of Hunger' Revisited -- Distance vs. the Heart -- My Divine Comedy -- The Armistice -- The Deep End -- Cacofonix -- Sky Burial -- The Brink -- The Truth About Pain -- Staph -- Notes -- Acknowledgments.