death of gnuplot if maxima is started from shell



Hi

With the new version of Maxima I have discovered
the following problem related to the gnuplot window 
appearing just for a fraction of a second if maxima is started 
from a shell command.
Is there a way to make the gnuplot window "persistent"?

The specific problem appears in an article
I wrote in LaTex together with the package ADVI
which contains the following command
and which used to start a gnuplot window:
"
xterm -e "maxima --batch=./sarag/ex3.mac;echo press return;read a"
"

The commands in "ex3.mac" are:
"
dir : "./sarag/";
modLoad(modName) :=
  load(concat(dir,modName));
modLoad("sarag.mac");
t3;
r3 : topology(t3,x,y);
drawTopology(r3[2]);
"

   Fabrizio