- I Shall Salute the Sun Once Again
I shall salute the sun once again
to the stream that flowed within me,
to the clouds that were my tallest thoughts,
to the painful growth of aspens in the garden
who endured the seasons of drought with me,
to the flock of crows
who as a gift
brought the fields nocturnal scent to me,
to my mother who lived in a
mirror
and revealed the figure of my old age,
and to the earth, whose burning womb I’ve filled
with green seeds in my lust for
repetition
I shall salute once again.
- The Forbidden Walls
Now forbidding walls
frontier walls rise again
in the quiet night like plants
sentries posted on my love’s estate
I can sense it
I know
when it’s time to pray
Now all the stars
are making love
Come back with me
Come back with me
to the start of creation
to the fragrant core of a fertilized egg
to the moment I was born from you
Come back with me
You’ve left me incomplete
Now the doves
on the tips of my breasts
take wing
Now kisses cocooned in my lips
stir like butterflies thinking of flight
Now
my body’s an altar
ready for the rites of love.
Let me conceive by the moon in the
sanctuary of the night
Let me be filled
by small raindrops
by infant hearts
by the weight of children not yet born
Perhaps my love could be
the womb of another Jesus.
- The Captive
I think about it and yet I know
I’ll never be able to leave this cage
even if the warden should let me go
I’ve lost the strength to fly away.
Every morning from behind the bars
my child’s eyes smile at me
as I start to sing
his kissing lips near mine.
God, if I need to fly one day
from behind these silent bars,
how will I answer this child’s wet eyes?
Let me be, I am a captive bird!
- Green Delusion
I wept all day to my mirror
Spring had given my window away
to the green delusion of trees
how cramped I was in my cocoon alone
my crown of paper mildewed
and polluting the air of that sunless realm
I couldn’t anymore, I couldn’t
Street sounds, bird song
tennis balls bounding away
flurry of children fleeing
balloons bobbing, climbing
like soap bubbles
to the tips of their branches of string
and through ancient clefts
in my fortress of silence
whose walls securely hemmed me in
the wind called my heart by its name
panting as though sunk in love’s deepest,
darkest moment.
- I Sinned
Beside a body, tremulous and dazed
I sinned, I voluptuously sinned.
O God! How could I know what I did
in that dark retreat of silence?
In that dark retreat of silence
I sat, disheveled, beside him
passion poured from his lips into mine
saved I was from the agony of a foolish heart.
Passion struck a flame in his eyes
the red wine danced in the glass
in the soft bed, my body
shivered drunk on his breast.
I sinned, I voluptuously sinned
in arms hot and fiery
I sinned in his arms
ironstrong, hot, and avenging.
- Conquest of the Garden
The crow that flew over our heads
and plunged into the perturbed thought
of a passing cloud,
whose cry traversed like a short spear,
the expanse of the horizon
will carry out news to town.
Everyone knows
everyone knows
that you and I gazed at the garden
and picked the apple
from that coy and distant branch.
Everyone fears
everyone fears, but you and I
joined the water, and; mirror, and light
and did not fear.
In the green, flowing forest
in the anxious, coldblooded sea
in the strange, haughty mountain
we asked, one night of the wild hares,
the pearlfilled shells, the eagles
What must be done?
Everyone knows
we found our way
into the cold and silent repose of phoenixes
we found the truth in the little garden
in the bashful look of a nameless flower
and eternity in the neverending moment
when two suns gaze at each other.
- Rebirth
Life is perhaps
a long street through which a woman;
holding a basket passes every day.
Life is perhaps
a rope with which a man hangs himself from a branch.
Life is perhaps a child returning home from school.
Life is perhaps lighting up a cigarette
in the narcotic repose between two lovers
or the absent gaze of a passerby
who takes off his hat to another passerby
with a meaningless smile and a good morning.
I will plant my hands in the garden
I will grow,
I know, I know, I know,
and swallows will lay eggs
in the hollow of my inkstained hands.
I shall wear twin cherries as earrings
and I shall put dahlia petals on my fingernails.
The journey of a form along the line of time
and inseminating the line of time with the form,
a form conscious of an image
returning from a feast in the mirror.
And it is in this way
that someone dies
and someone lives on.
- Someone who is Like No One
I've had a dream that someone is coming.
I have dreamt of a red star,
and my eye lids keep twitching
and my shoes keep snapping to attention
and may I go blind if I’m lying.
I have dreamt of that red star
when I wasn’t asleep.
Someone’s coming,
someone’s coming,
someone who is with us in his heart,
in his breath, in his voice
Someone whose coming cannot be arrested
and handcuffed, and thrown in jail
Someone amidst firecrackers
from the sky above Toopkhaneh Square will come
and will spread the tablecloth
and will distribute the bread
and will distribute the Pepsi
and will distribute the public park
and will distribute the whooping cough syrup
and will distribute Enrollment Day
and will distribute every bloated thing
and will give us our share too
I dreamed.
- Let Us Believe in the Beginning of a Cold Season
And here I am
a lonely woman
at the threshold of a cold season
coming to understand the earth’s contamination
and the elemental, sad despair of the sky
and the impotence of these concrete hands.
Time passed,
time passed and the clock chimed four times,
it chimed four times.
Today is the first day of winter,
I know the secret of the seasons
and understand the moments well.
The savior is asleep in his grave
and earth, the kind acceptor, earth,
invites me to peace.
Perhaps those two young hands were true,
those two young hands
buried below the never ending snow
And next year, when spring
sleeps with the sky beyond the window
and shoots thrust from her body
the green shoots of empty branches
will blossom O my dearest one, my dearest only one
Let us believe in the beginning of a cold season
- It is Only the Voice that Remains
Why should I stop?
the road passes through the capillary veins of life
The fertile quality of atmosphere
in the womb of the moon
will kill the corrupt cells,
and in the chemical expanse after sunrise
there is only the voice
the voice that will be
absorbed in the atoms of time
why should I stop?
The trees are my ancestors
Breathing stale air depresses me
A bird already dead
counseled me to remember flight
To join the glowing
essence of the sun,
such union is the ultimate in power,
pouring down the light of understanding Windmills
naturally fall apart
Why should I stop?
Under my breast
I press a sheaf of unripe wheat
nursing it
The voice, the voice , the voice , only the voice
the voice of the tall yearning of plants to grow
the voice of the transparent wish of water to flow
the voice of starlight pouring
on the surface of the pistil of the earth
the voice of conception of the seed of meaning
and expansion of love’s common mind
The voice , the voice, the voice
it is only the voice that remains.
- Red Rose
He took me to the garden of red roses
And in the darkness he placed a red rose
in my trembling hair
Finally
he slept with me on the petal of a red rose.
O paralyzed pigeons
O untried, menopausal trees,
O blind windows
Beneath my heart,
in the depths of my womb, now
a red rose is growing
red rose;
red
like a flag on
Resurrection Day
Ah, I am pregnant, pregnant, pregnant.
Copyright © 1998 Irandukht Productions
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