بوی کاهگل و آواز پرنده

The Smell of Adobe and Birdsong

Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari

محمد ابراهیم جعفریMohammad Ebrahim Jafari۱۳۹۶ / 2017
فارسی کوتاه‌ترین غزلی که می‌شناسم «بید مجنون» است. شنیده‌ام: هنر حیاتی شدت یافته است. عشق با نگاه شدّت‌یافته آغاز می‌شود، نگاهی درخشنده و تابناک. اگر شگفتی امروز را تا آخرین قطره بنوشی، فردا تشنه‌تر خواهی بود. یک نفس از امروز را به فردا مگذار، آن که در دیروز نفس می‌کشد، امروز آوازی تازه ندارد. میان سنت و نوگرایی پلی است که با پاهای شوق پیموده می‌شود.
از هم‌آغوشی جانم با شوق
در پی تاب و تبی پیچاپیچ
سایه‌ای می‌روید
در پسِ پردهٔ هیچ...
وقتی نگاهی نو به واقعیت می‌کنی، واقعیت به واقعه تبدیل می‌شود. باغ شعر من در این سایه‌ها گل داده است. من باور دارم که...
«الهام هرچه باشد از نمی‌دانم دائم می‌روید.»۱
من باور دارم که...
«شعر نباید معنی داشته باشد شعر باید باشد.»۲
محمد ابراهیم جعفری ۱۳۹۶
١ ویساوا شیمبورسکا، شاعر لهستانی، برندهٔ جایزهٔ نوبل ادبیات، (۱۹۲۳–۲۰۱۲).
٢ آرچی بالد مکلیش، شاعر و کتابدار امریکایی، (۱۸۹۲–۱۹۸۲).
English The shortest ghazal I know is the weeping willow.
Translator’s note

بید مجنون (bid-e majnun), the Persian name for the weeping willow, is literally Majnun's willow — named for the madman-lover of Layli. The tree is already a love poem: a name out of a romance, a shape that hangs like a lament. English keeps the weeping and loses the lover.

I have heard it said: art is a life intensified. Love begins with a gaze intensified — a gaze that shines, a gaze that blazes. Drink today's wonder to the last drop and tomorrow you will be thirstier still. Don't leave a single breath of today for tomorrow. Whoever breathes in yesterday has no new song today. Between tradition and the new there stands a bridge, and it is paced out on the feet of ardor.
From my soul's coupling with ardor,
in the wake of a heat and a fever, writhing,
a shadow grows
behind the curtain of nothing…
Translator’s note

روییدن (ruidan) is the verb for a plant coming up, and it is this page's own refrain: a shadow grows here; inspiration grows continually out of I do not know at the foot of the page; and in Farrokhi's introduction a peasant's fortune has grown like a shadow beside his feet. It is given as "grow" in all three. The Persian also rhymes پیچاپیچ (coil upon coil) with هیچ (nothing) — writhing / nothing is a reach for that chime.

When you look at reality with a new eye, reality turns into an occasion.
Translator’s note

واقعیت (vâqe'iyat, reality) and واقعه (vâqe'e, event) are one root, Arabic و-ق-ع, "to fall, to befall": reality is what has fallen out, an event is what falls. English can hold the pun only by falling in Latin — case, occasion, incident, accident all come down from cadere, "to fall." Hence "occasion" rather than "event."

My garden of poetry has come into flower in these shadows. I believe that…
"Whatever inspiration may be, it grows continually out of I do not know."1
I believe that…
"A poem should not mean
But be."2
Translator’s note

The page closes by giving one line each to the two poets it footnotes. The first is Szymborska's, from her 1996 Nobel lecture — in her own English, "whatever inspiration is, it's born from a continuous I don't know." The Persian keeps دائم, "continually," but swaps her born for می‌روید, the plant-verb that runs through the rest of this page, so here inspiration grows out of not-knowing rather than being born from it. The second is MacLeish, the close of Ars Poetica, restored to his own words rather than translated back out of the Persian.

Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari, 2017
1 Wisława Szymborska, Polish poet, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, (1923–2012).
2 Archibald MacLeish, American poet and librarian, (1892–1982).
سرخی دانهٔ انار — پیشگفتار خسرو سیناییThe Redness of the Pomegranate Seed — Preface by Khosrow Sinaiاردیبهشت ۱۳۹۶ / Spring 2017
فارسی بالاخره پس از سال‌ها تأخیر، آنچه که باید، اتفاق افتاد. من فقط خوشحال نیستم، ذوق‌زده‌ام. خوب می‌دانم که این ذوق‌زدگی فقط از سر رفاقت من با محمدابراهیم جعفری نیست. یادم هست چند سال پیش فردی منتقد از من پرسید: «شما فکر می‌کنی خودت هنرمندی؟!» جواب دادم: «نمی‌دانم!»

...اما خوب می‌دانم که حدود شصت‌سال با انواع هنرمندان ارتباط دوستی دور و نزدیک داشته‌ام، شاعر... نقاش... موسیقیدان... و بالاخره فیلمساز... و آموخته‌ام تشخیص دهم که چه کسی ذاتاً هنرمند است و چه‌کسی با باد به غبغب انداختن و تفرعن و نوچه‌پروری آثارش را به مردمان تحمیل می‌کند. طی همهٔ این سال‌ها چه نادر بودند کسانی که ذات هنرمندشان، مرا به شگفتی واداشت، و بی‌تردید محمدابراهیم جعفری یکی از آن‌هاست.
English At last, after years of delay, the thing that had to happen has happened. I am not merely glad — I am struck with delight. And I know well that this delight is not simply a matter of my comradeship with Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari. I remember a critic asking me, a few years ago: "Do you think you yourself are an artist?!" I answered: "I don't know!"

...But this much I do know: for some sixty years I have kept friendships, near and far, with artists of every kind — poets... painters... musicians... and at last filmmakers — and I have learned to tell the one who is an artist by his very nature from the one who puffs out his jowls, plays the pharaoh, breeds a retinue of yes-men, and forces his work on people. In all those years, how rare were the ones whose artist's nature struck me with wonder — and Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari is, beyond doubt, one of them.
طنزگزندهٔ او در بعضی از اشعارش همیشه مرا در فضایی میان اشعار عبید زاکانی و ایرج‌میرزا قرار می‌داد. یادم نمی‌رود در آن شب‌هایی که بر سرمان بمب و موشک می‌بارید، او در جمع دوستان دوتارش را برمی‌داشت، ضرب‌آهنگی را تکرار می‌کرد و با صدایی خش‌دار برایمان می‌خواند: «جنگلا پُر تَمشکه!» و ما دوستان در آن شب‌های غم‌آلود، با احساسی میان گریه و خنده با او همدل و همزبان و هم‌آواز می‌شدیم. مگر نه این که او در پایان شعری گفته:
«گاه خندان می‌گریم...
گاه گریان می‌خندم...
عاقلان می‌گویند:...
من هنرمندم!»
بعدها از روش آوازخوانی‌اش که ایرانی بود، محلی بود، غیرمتعارف بود، اما اصیل و امروزی بود، کسانی برداشت کردند، به شهرت رسیدند و کمتر کسی دانست که او آغازگر آن راه بود.
The biting satire of some of his poems always set me somewhere between the verse of Obeyd Zakani and Iraj Mirza. I will never forget those nights when bombs and missiles rained down on our heads: among friends he would take up his dutar, work a rhythm over and over, and sing to us in that raspy voice — "The woods are full o' brambleberries!" And on those grief-laden nights we friends, with a feeling caught between weeping and laughter, became of one heart, one tongue, one voice with him. Did he not say, at the close of one poem:
"Sometimes I weep for laughing…
sometimes I laugh for weeping…
The sane ones have a word for it:
I am an artist!"
Translator’s note

Obeyd Zakani (d. c. 1370) and Iraj Mirza (1874–1926) are the great satirists of Persian verse — the first scabrous and obscene, the second a Qajar prince who wrote in the plainest street idiom. To be placed "between" them is to be placed in a line of poets who mock power and piety with a straight face. عاقلان is "the sane ones," those in possession of عقل, reason — and the joke of the last line is that sanity's diagnosis for a man who laughs while weeping is artist.

Later, others took up his way of singing — Iranian, regional, unconventional, and yet rooted and of today — and rose to fame, and few knew that he had been the one to open that road.
گاه فروتنی و صمیمیت ترانه‌هایش مرا به یاد باباطاهر می‌اندازد. وقتی می‌گوید:
دوتا کفتر سفید و زعفرونی
نشستن دِ تثار سایه‌بونی
سفیده ناله سو... سیل شفق کرد
سه کو... آفتو مِزه مِثه جوونی
گاه در رندی و ظرافت اشعارش همان جنس وجود شاعری را می‌یابم که بزرگی چون حافظ را به تاریخ فرهنگمان هدیه کرد. او همیشه در ذهن من تروبادورهای قرون وسطای اروپا را تداعی می‌کند، همان خوانندگان دوره‌گردی که آوازخوان از شهری به شهری می‌رفتند، و سرودن جزئی از بودنشان بود.
Sometimes the humility and the warmth of his songs put me in mind of Baba Taher. When he says:
Two pigeons, one white, one saffron,
settled in the shade of an arbor.
The white one gave a moan… and looked at the red of the dawn.
Look — the sun tastes of youth.
Translator’s note

A do-bayti in rural dialect — the form Baba Taher made his own, which is why Sinai reaches for his name. Two dialect facts carry it: سیل کردن (sil kardan) in Lori and Bakhtiari means to look, not "to flood," so it is the dove that looks at the dawn and not the dawn that floods; and آفتو، مِزه، مِثه are the dialect's آفتاب، مزه، مثل — sun, taste, like. The last two lines are damaged in the source: "look —" for سه کو follows the looking of the line before it, and is a guess.

And sometimes, in the rendi and the fineness of his verse, I find that same stuff of poetic being which made a gift of Hafez to the history of our culture. He has always called to my mind the troubadours of medieval Europe — those wandering singers who went from town to town in song, and for whom composing was a part of their very being.
Translator’s note

رند (rend) is Hafez's own word for his own kind: the wine-loving, hypocrisy-piercing free spirit whose disreputability is a form of integrity. "Rogue," "libertine," "rake" each catch a third of him, so the Persian is left standing here — Sinai names Hafez in the same sentence, and the word is half of his argument.

همیشه به او گفته‌ام که ذهن شاعرانه آنچنان در تو می‌جوشد، که چون فرزندانی که قدر ثروت پدری را نمی‌دانند، ثروت ذاتی وجودت را چنان مُسرفانه و با فروتنی ارائه می‌کنی، که آن‌ها که از حساسیت هنرمندانه تو بی‌بهره‌اند، ممکن است به‌سادگی از آن‌ها بگذرند و در انتظار شاعرانی! بمانند که باد به غیبغب می‌اندازند و آنچه را که نه خود می‌فهمند و نه مخاطبان، با آب‌وتاب به دیگران حُقنه می‌کنند.

اگر بپذیریم که جنین شعر در ذهن شاعر جان می‌گیرد و رشد می‌کند؛ آنچه که آن را به بیرون از ذهن متجلی می‌کند، یعنی به مخاطب منتقل می‌کند، جز ابزاری نیست که شاعر بر آن تسلط دارد، و این ابزار کلام می‌تواند باشد، موسیقی باشد، نقاشی باشد، و یا هر هنر دیگری که عامل خلاقیت شاعرانه در آن نقشی دارد. جعفری طی سال‌ها از دو گونه ابزار استفاده کرده است: کلام و نقاشی، که در دومی سال‌ها در مقام استاد به پرورش نسل‌های جوان پرداخته است. یکی از شاگردانش که امروز خود نقاش نامداری‌ست، روزی درباره او به من گفت: «اغلب اساتید به ما فنون نقاشی را می‌آموختند، اما او علاوه‌بر آن روح هنرمند را در ما بیدار می‌کرد.»
I have always told him: the poetic mind wells up in you so abundantly that — like children who don't know what their father's wealth is worth — you spend the wealth native to your being so prodigally, and so humbly, that those who lack your artist's sensitivity may pass it by, and go on waiting for "poets"! who puff out their jowls and, with much fanfare, force down other people's throats what neither they nor their listeners understand.

If we grant that the embryo of a poem takes life and grows in the poet's mind, then whatever brings it out of that mind — whatever carries it to another person — is nothing but an instrument the poet has mastered. That instrument may be the word, it may be music, it may be painting, or any other art in which the poetic creative force has a part to play. Over the years Jafari has used two instruments, word and painting, and in the second he spent years as a master, bringing on the young. One of his students, himself a renowned painter today, once said to me of him: "Most of our teachers taught us the techniques of painting; he, on top of that, woke the artist's soul in us."
راست می‌گفت! به‌عنوان دوستش همیشه او را چون سیم ظریف سه‌تاری شناخته‌ام که وقتی مرتعش می‌شود، فقط سیم‌هایی را به ارتعاش درمی‌آورد که از ظرافتی مشابه برخوردارند. همین یک شعر او نمونه‌ای از گواهان بسیار این گفتهٔ من است:
دل من انار هزاردانه‌ای‌ست
با توان سرخ عشقی
در هر دانه...
وقتی تو به من نگاه می‌کنی
یکی از دانه‌ها سرخ‌تر می‌شود.
اعتراف می‌کنم که به‌عنوان یکی از اهالی هنر، گاهی به جوشش شاعرانهٔ ذهن او غبطه خورده‌ام.
He was right. As his friend I have always known him as the fine string of a setar — the one that, when it is set trembling, wakes into vibration only those strings that share its delicacy. This single poem of his is one witness among many to what I mean:
My heart is a pomegranate of a thousand seeds,
a love's red strength
in every seed…
When you look at me,
one of the seeds turns redder.
I confess that, as one of art's own people, I have at times felt an admiring envy at the poetic welling of his mind.
خوشحالم که بالاخره به‌کوشش همسر گرامی‌اش، پذیرفت تا اشعارش، که به باور من از زلال‌ترین اشعار زمانهٔ ما هستند، به گسترهٔ وسیع‌تری از مخاطبان ارائه شود، تا پی‌ببرند که چگونه می‌توان بدون سردرگم کردن مخاطب در پیچیدگی جملات نامفهوم و هزارتوی نظریه‌های گنگ، ایرانی بود، اصیل بود، امروزی بود... و شاعر بود!
I am glad that at last, through the efforts of his dear wife, he agreed to let his poems — which I hold to be among the most limpid verse of our age — reach a wider range of readers, so that they may see how it is possible, without losing anyone in a tangle of unintelligible sentences and a thousand-fold labyrinth of inarticulate theory, to be Iranian, to be rooted, to be of today… and to be a poet!
خسرو سینایی، اردیبهشت ۱۳۹۶
Khosrow Sinai — Spring 2017
مقدمهٔ باجلان فرخیIntroduction by Bajlan Farrokhiاردیبهشت ۱۳۹۶ / Spring 2017
فارسی استاد محمد ابراهیم جعفری صورتگر و نقاش بزرگ را شعرهایی است که دوشادوش تکامل او در نقش‌بندی سرایش یافته و از به دفتر نشستن آن‌ها دوری جسته است. سرانجام اما ابرام همدم همدل و همسر فرزانهٔ وی، بانو مریم... و دوستان نزدیک به چاپ این نخستین دفتر انجامید. جعفری در نقاشی تثبیت‌کنندهٔ داده‌های سوبژکتیو لحظه‌های زندگی‌ست و در شعرهای خویش سخنگوی این لحظه‌ها... و چنین است که بسیاری از سروده‌هایش با نقش‌بندهایش پهلو می‌زند و گاه یک و همان است.
English Master Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari — the great image-maker and painter — has poems that were composed shoulder to shoulder with his growth in the binding of patterns, and that he kept from ever settling into a notebook. In the end, though, the insistence of his kindred companion and wise wife, Lady Maryam... and of close friends, brought this first volume to print. In painting, Jafari is the one who fixes fast the subjective data of life's moments; in his poems he is the spokesman of those moments — and so it is that many of his verses stand level with his paintings, and at times are one and the same.
Translator’s note

Two words for painter run through this introduction: صورتگر (surat-gar), a maker of forms and faces, and نقش‌بند (naqsh-band), a binder of patterns — the same word that names the Naqshbandi Sufi order. Farrokhi's claim, that the composing and the painting are one act, is already inside his vocabulary, so the English keeps the compounds standing: image-maker, the binding of patterns.

شعرهای کوتاه این دفتر در خوانش چنان چون ضرب‌آهنگ قلم‌مویی در خلق یک اثر می‌باشد و غنای آن در مرحلهٔ نخست یادآور تک‌بیت‌های شگفت‌انگیز شاعران کلاسیک پارسی و گاه هایکوهای ژرف ژاپنی است؛ و در کار شعر همانند نقاشی نه پیرو دیگران که متکی بر خویشتن خویش است. صورتگران شاعر در کار خویش باریک‌بین و بی‌همتا هستند — در سرزمین‌های دیگر نیز می‌توان از ژنی‌هایی چون وانگ وی، نقاش و شاعر چینی (۶۳۷–۷۴۰ میلادی)، و میکل‌آنژ، پیکرتراش، نقاش و شاعر ایتالیایی، یاد کرد.

از جعفری است:
من
خاموشم
تا ماه... با تو... بگوید
In the reading, the short poems of this volume are like the rhythm of a brush bringing a work into being; their richness, at first encounter, recalls the astonishing single couplets of the classical Persian poets, and at times the profound Japanese haiku. And in the work of poetry, as in painting, he follows no one but his own self. Painter-poets are fine-eyed and without peer in their work — in other lands too one can name geniuses like Wang Wei, the Chinese painter and poet (637–740 AD), and Michelangelo, the Italian sculptor, painter, and poet.

From Jafari:
I
am silent
so that the moon… may speak with you…
→ quiet-moon
که گویی ماه از سویی به یاری شاعر آمده است تا با همدلی از ناگفته‌های او و یگانه شدن با شاعر بگوید که خاموشی و شب سرشار از ناگفته‌هاست.

و این شعر از وانگ وی در برگردان فارسی:
تنهایم و عود می‌نوازم در نیزار دور
نوایی را با سوت زمزمه می‌کنم
در نیزار بی‌انتها کسی نیست
ماه و انوار رخشانش
و این شعر باشو (۱۶۴۴–۱۶۹۴ میلادی)، از برگردان فارسی شاملو و پاشایی:
ابرها
استراحتی می‌دهند
نظارگان ماه را
و این شعر از جعفری که تابلویی شگفت‌انگیز است:
پنجاه سال است
که این قمری
بر شاخهٔ پر برف نشسته است.
که در آن زمان به بی‌زمانی و قمری به جاودانگی راه می‌یابد.

و باز این شعر جعفری:
وقتی به یاد تو گریه می‌کنم، اشک‌هایم آبی است...
من تو را آسمانی دوست دارم
که عشق آبی است و آسمان نیز
— as if the moon, for its part, has come to the poet's aid: to speak in fellow-feeling of everything he leaves unsaid, and by becoming one with him to say that silence and the night are brimming with the unsaid.

And this poem by Wang Wei, in Persian rendering:
Alone, I play the oud in a far reed-bed;
under my breath I whistle a tune.
In the endless reeds there is no one.
The moon — and its shining rays.
And this poem by Bashō (1644–1694 AD), from the Persian of Shamlou and Pashaei:
Clouds
give a moment's rest
to the moon-gazers.
Translator’s note

Both of these reach English by way of Persian, and the journey shows. Wang Wei's poem is the "Bamboo Grove" (竹里館): in the Chinese he sits in a dark bamboo grove and plays a qin, a zither; in the Persian the bamboo has become a نیزار, a reed-bed, and the zither an عود — and since نی, reed, is also the Persian flute, the instrument turns up twice in a poem about playing alone. The Bashō arrives through Ahmad Shamlou and A. Pashaei's Persian versions. Wang Wei's dates are given here as 637–740; they are usually 699–759.

And this poem by Jafari, which is an astonishing painting:
Fifty years now
this turtledove
has sat on a branch heaped with snow.
— in which time finds its way to timelessness, and the turtledove to eternity.

And again, this poem of Jafari's:
When I weep in memory of you, my tears are blue…
I love you a sky's love —
for love is blue, and so is the sky.
و این شعر، یادمان غمبار زلزلهٔ رودبار در ۱۳۶۹:
در شب زلزله...
ماه در چشم کرم شبتاب
بارانی از مهتاب شد... و...
بر آوارها ریخت.
کرم شبتاب توان نداشت تا بشنود
غم‌انگیزترین همسرایی را
از مردمی که
هرگز چنین یکدل نخوانده‌اند.
تا... آخرین نفس...
که تابلوی غمبار و غم‌آوایی دردناک است تا... آخرین نفس....
And this poem — a grievous memorial to the Rudbar earthquake of 1369 (1990):
On the night of the earthquake…
the moon, in the eye of a firefly,
turned to a rain of moonlight… and…
poured over the rubble.
The firefly had not the strength to hear
the most grief-stirring chorus
from a people who
had never sung so with one heart.
Until… the last breath…
— a grievous tableau, a painful dirge, until… the last breath….
سروده‌های بلند جعفری همانند شعرهای کوتاه وی و تابلوهای شگفت‌انگیزش، تو در توست. شعر او پیوسته نیست و همانند بسیاری از شاعران ماندگار، در گذر زمان و با توجه به تاریخ سروده‌ها، از رمانتیک تا شعر روز، از نظر شکل و محتوا دگرگون می‌شود — که ذات جعفری صورتگر و شاعر ایستا نیست و مدام در شدن است:
در کوره‌راه‌ها
آبی، خاکستری، سیاه
دهقانی است با چوبدست بلندش
سپید، سیاه
خرش را می‌گویم
با خرواری از خارهای باران‌زده
سیاه سیاه...

بختش را می‌گویم.
که همچون سایه در کنار پاهایش روییده است.
که تابلویی است از دهقانی با جامهٔ آبی، شلوار خاکستری، و خر سیاه‌وسفید، بارکش با باری از خارهای باران‌خورده برای افروختن هیزم اجاق و تنور دیگران — نماد فقر روستا و...
Jafari's long poems, like his short poems and his astonishing paintings, are fold within fold. His poetry is not all of a piece; like that of many enduring poets it changes over time — and the change can be tracked by the dates of the poems, from the romantic to the verse of the day — shifting in form and in content alike. For the essence of Jafari, image-maker and poet, is not static: it is forever in the act of becoming:
On the back roads —
blue, gray, black —
a peasant with his long staff.
White, black.
His donkey, I mean —
under a donkey-load of rain-beaten thorns.
Black, black…

His fortune, I mean —
which has grown like a shadow beside his feet.
→ road-peasant
— a tableau of a peasant in a blue robe and gray trousers with a black-and-white pack donkey, carrying a load of rain-beaten thorns to kindle the fire in other people's hearths and bread ovens: a symbol of village poverty, and…
و تابلو شعر آبشار:
آن آبشار سرخوش و مستم
که سال‌ها
بر ماسه‌های گرم تنت اشک ریختم
دیوانه‌وار
تا که بمیرم به دامنت
از دام برف‌های سپیدم گریختم
که در آن ریزش انوار خورشید بر تنهٔ آبشار و قطره‌های رنگارنگ آب چون برق، تیر نگاه، و امواج سینهٔ آبشار به سپیدی ماه است — و در شوق یکی شدن، قله تا دریا را در می‌نوردد. با رسیدن به دریا در آرزوی بازگشت به دره‌های دور و قله است — چرخه‌ای که آرزوی بازگشت به آغاز را مطرح می‌سازد. شعری است که حدود شصت سال پیش سروده شده و از شعر شاعران آن روزگار اگر فراتر نباشد با همان سبک و سیاق با آن‌ها پهلو می‌زند. گویای جانی همیشه شاعر و مداماً هوشیار است — احساس فرو شدن در طبیعت، یگانه شدن با آبشار، آرزوی فرو شدن در دریای بی‌پایان، و باز آرزوی بازگشت به قله.
And the tableau-poem of the waterfall:
I am that blithe, drunken waterfall
who for years
wept on the warm sands of your body,
like a madman,
and to die in your lap
leapt free of the trap of my own white snows.
→ drunk-waterfall
Translator’s note

The Persian closes on two sounds at once: دامنت (dâman-at, your skirt — and also a mountain's skirt, which is where a waterfall actually ends) against دام (dâm, snare), and ریختم (I poured out) against گریختم (I fled). English can hold one pair — lap against trap — and "leapt" is offered for the fleeing, since leaping is what a waterfall does with its freedom.

In it the sun's rays fall on the body of the waterfall, the many-colored droplets like lightning, like the arrow of a glance, and the waves of the waterfall's breast are white as the moon — and in its ardor to become one, it spans peak to sea. Reaching the sea, it longs for the distant valleys and the summit again — a cycle that raises the wish to return to the beginning. It is a poem written some sixty years ago, and in the very same style and idiom it stands level with the verse of the poets of that age, if it does not go beyond them. It bespeaks a soul forever a poet and perpetually awake — the sense of sinking into nature, of becoming one with the waterfall, the wish to sink into the endless sea, and again the wish to return to the peak.
عاشقانه‌های جعفری در این دفتر اندک نیست، چرا که بسیاری از این نمودها از جانی همیشه عاشق بر می‌خیزند — و در برترین نما، نه عشقی اروتیک، که عشقی است به انسان و همهٔ باشندگان:
دوستت دارم
این گمان
ای سرود سالخورد جاودان
این سرشتهٔ فرشته‌های آسمان
این یقین
این کهن‌ترین ترانهٔ زمین
مثل رنگ ابر
مثل بوی خاک
مثل طعم اشک
مثل خواب کوه‌ها همیشگی است...
The love poems in this volume are not few, for many of these showings rise from a soul forever in love — and in their highest aspect this is no erotic love, but a love for the human being and for all that is:
I love you —
this surmise,
O ancient, undying anthem,
this leaven kneaded by the angels of heaven,
this certainty,
this oldest song of the earth —
like the color of cloud,
like the smell of clay,
like the taste of tears,
like the sleep of mountains, it goes on always…
→ oldest-song
Translator’s note

سرشته (kneaded, moulded) chimes against فرشته (angel) in the Persian. "Leaven … heaven" is a reach for a rhyme in the same place, and it keeps the dough: سرشتن is what a baker does.

و باز در این دفتر اینجا و آنجا صورتگر بزرگ را می‌بینی که در آرزوی در خود شدن است — تا از جان خویش تابلویی بی‌بدیل برآورد و سرایش و پردازش‌های خود را یک و همان کند:
کاشکی من برج ویرانی به راهی دور بودم
تا که در شب‌های بارانی
کبوترها نم‌آلوده به زیر سقف ایوانم
به یک پا تکیه می‌دادند و می‌خفتند.
…
پای ایوان در کنار آتش سوزان
دو شبگرد غم‌آلوده
برای یکدگر از سرگذشت خویش می‌گفتند.
And here and there in this volume, again, you see the great image-maker longing to turn inward — to raise a peerless tableau out of his own soul, and to make his singing and his brushwork one and the same:
Would that I were a ruined tower on a far road,
so that on rainy nights
the rain-damp pigeons, under the roof of my veranda,
would lean on one leg and sleep.
…
At the foot of the veranda, beside the burning fire,
two grief-worn night watchmen
told each other all that had befallen them.
→ old-news
که جعفری در هنر، تمام دنیایش پنجره‌ای است دستی و حنجره‌ای توانمند — که در این قلعهٔ پیر بس سخن‌های ناگفته دارد، در تجانس آوایی و تجسم کلماتش و رنگین‌کمان رنگ‌ها و نقش‌بندی‌هایش.

بگذار خواننده را بر خوانش سروده‌های این دفتر واگذاریم و چونان هوکوسایی باشیم که آرزویش خلاصه کردن همهٔ آثار خود در نقطه‌ای بود، و بس.
For Jafari, in art, his whole world is a window made by hand and a throat of great power — and in this aged fortress he keeps many an unspoken word, in the kinship of his sounds and the bodying-forth of his words, and in the rainbow of his colors and his patterns.

Let us leave the reader to the reading of this volume's poems, and be like Hokusai, whose wish was to sum up all of his work in a single dot — and no more.
باجلان فرخی (م.ح)، اردیبهشت ۱۳۹۶
Bajlan Farrokhi (M.H.) — Spring 2017
از جعفریFrom Jafari
فارسی
امشب صدای کبوترانم را نقاشی کردم.
در دیوارهای تو به توی سایه
کی ترا شناختم
من آواز خواندم
من با دوتار پیری آواز خواندم
و خط‌های آبی‌رنگ صدای زنی که دوستش دارم
آواز خستهٔ مرا رنگین کرد
من و تو آواز خواندیم
تا نفسِ مهتاب خاکستری شد...
⟨…⟩
تمام شب... مهتاب در مربع خنده‌های تو
کودکیم را نقاشی می‌کرد
کاش باران ببارد...
کاش باران ببارد...
بوی کاهگل
آواز پرنده را
پررنگ‌تر می‌کند.
English
Tonight I painted the voices of my doves.
On the fold-upon-fold walls of the shadow —
when did I come to know you?
I sang.
I sang with an aged dotar,
and the blue lines of a woman's voice — a woman I love —
gave my tired song its colour.
You and I sang
until the breath of the moonlight went gray...
⟨…⟩
All night... the moonlight, in the square of your laughter,
was painting my childhood.
If only it would rain...
If only it would rain...
The smell of adobe
deepens the colour
of the bird's song.
→ adobe-birdsong [ read from the manuscript against its printed twin — the passage marked ⟨…⟩ is unread, not elided ]
Translator’s note

This page is in Jafari's own hand, and it is where the book gets its name. Its last three lines are بوی کاهگل / آواز پرنده را / پررنگ‌تر می‌کند — the smell of adobe deepens the colour of the bird's song — and the title on the cover is lifted from them. Note that the Persian is not a pairing of two nice things but a claim about one acting on the other. The same sentence comes back in the long dream-letter to Hossein Alizadeh, where Alizadeh is the one who says it.

The page is a fair copy, in his hand, of the poem printed on page 72 of the book, which stands in this collection as adobe-birdsong. Reading the two together resolves nearly all of what was unreadable here: the printed text is what identifies صدای کبوترانم (the voices of my doves), دوتار پیری (an aged dotar) and رنگین (gave it colour). Two places where this manuscript departs from the print are kept as the manuscript has them — کی ترا شناختم, a line the printed page does not carry, and تو به توی, "fold upon fold," which is very likely the answer to a crux in the print, where the same phrase is set as توبه تو and reads as "the walls of your repentance."

An earlier English here, built on a corrupt OCR of this page, opened "tonight I painted the bruise-blue sound of my song." That was a mirage: صدای کبوترانم, the voices of his doves, had been split into صدای کبود ترانم. In the same way من با دوتار پیری became برین باد و کارپوری, رنگین became زانی, and بوی کاهگل — the book's own title — became بودی کامنگل. The doubled کاش باران ببارد, which had been dismissed here as a scanning artifact, is real: the poet writes the line twice.

محمد ابراهیم جعفری
Mohammad Ebrahim Jafari — in his own hand
Page & TitleTranslatedWritten
عنوانصفحه
21
Adobe
A bird calls
bird-behind-wall
4-8-2026Autumn 1989
۲۱
بوی کاهگل
پرنده ای
28
Old News
I wish I was a ruined watch tower
old-news
1960 - ۱۳۳۹
۲۸
آخرین خبر
کاشکی من برج ویرانی به راهی دور بودم
30
Moonlight, Sunlight
Go - be moonlight for another’s evening
moonlight-sunlight
4-3-2026Borojerd 1960 - ۱۳۳۹
۳۰
مهتاب
بُرو مهتاب شام دیگران باش
35
Ancient Tree
An ancient tree
ancient-tree
3/22/261961 - ۱۳۴۰
۳۵
درختی کهن
تک درختی کهن
40
Life...
Life...
life-tune
University Quarter, Tehran, 1963 - ۱۳۴۲
۴۰
زندگی...
زندگی...
48
To my daughter Shade
moments
shadow-daughter
4-29-261980s دهه ۱۳۶۰
۴۸
به دخترم سایه
لحظه ها
50
I closed my eyes
bomb-kiss
1984 - ۱۳۶۳
۵۰
چشمانم را بستم
61
In the space between the sea & jungle
jungle-bomb
1988 - ۱۳۶۷/۲/۱۶
۶۱
در فاصله دریا و جنگل
62
I told you my poem …
laugh-cry
1988 - ۱۳۶۷/۹
۶۲
شعرم را برای تو گفتم...
66
Ah struggle…
soul-mold
1989 - ۱۳۶۸
۶۶
های...
70
Stay
You wish to stay
stay-go
۷۰
می خواهی بمان
می خواهی بمان،
100
Spring came
gone-coming
March 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۲/۱۷
۱۰۰
بهار می آید و تو رفته ای
127
I
quiet-moon
April 1991 - فروردین ۱۳۷۰
۱۲۷
من
128
One thousand birds of love
heart-partridge
March 1991 - کلاردشت ۱۳۷۰/۱/۴
۱۲۸
هزار پرنده عاشق
131
No matter how much
meager-dew
April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۶
۱۳۱
هر چه دوستم داری
149
I watered the cage
water-cage
July 25 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۵/۳
۱۴۹
قفس را دادم
172
The tree
tree-eyes
1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۸
۱۷۲
من درختم
182
Nightingale couldn't weather a cloud
nightingale-cloud
7/19/262001 - ۱۳۸۰
۱۸۲
هوای ابر را بلبل نداره
202
you
morning-glory
05/03/20262000s - دهه ۱۳۸۰
۲۰۲
تو
203
Snow falls...
snow-beautiful
05/3/20261990s - دهه ۱۳۷۰
۲۰۳
برف میبارد...

بوی کاهگل

Adobe

Autumn 1989 · p. 21 · translated 4-8-2026

bird-behind-wall

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پرنده ای پشت دیوار کاهگلی می خواند. دیوار را نقاشی کردم باران بارید دیوار پاک شد. بوی کاهگل با آواز پرنده ماند

Translation

A bird calls behind a cob wall. I painted the clay the rain washed it away. The smell of wet hay with bird song remains

آخرین خبر

Old News

1960 - ۱۳۳۹ · p. 28

old-news

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کاشکی من برج ویرانی به راهی دور بودم تا که در شب های بارانی کبوتر ها نم آلوده به زیر سقف ایوانم به یک پا تکیه میدادند و می‌خفتند بوی نم آلود و مستی آور پر ها با صدای وهم انگیز نفس های کبوترها کاهگل ها خیس باران خاطرات دور دوران را به خاطر زنده میسازد اسب خاطر را به شهر یادهای دور می‌تازد کاشکی من برج ویرانی به راهی دور بودم تا که در شب های بارانی کبوتر ها نم آلوده به زیر سقف ایوانم به یک پا تکیه میدادند و می‌خفتند پای ایوان در کنار آتش سوزان دو شبگرد غم آلوده برای یکدگر از سرگذشت خویش می گفتند.

Translation

I wish I was a ruined watch tower on a back county road so that on rainy nights the damp & dirty pigeons could sleep on one leg under my railings. The damp drunken smell of filth & feather the sound of their weeze & rasp the wet clay, wet cob, mouldering adobe - it brings to mind an older era - a lost way to make a living. & So the horses of our minds run off to towns of nostalgia. But I do wish I was a ruined watch tower on a back county road so that on rainy nights the damp & dirty pigeons could sleep on one leg under my railings & there by it’s base 2 watchmen burn fire telling tales & adventures to one another

مهتاب

Moonlight, Sunlight

Borojerd 1960 - ۱۳۳۹ · p. 30 · translated 4-3-2026

moonlight-sunlight

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بُرو مهتاب شام دیگران باش دو روزی هم به کام دیگران باش مرا در سرد سیر غم رها کن برو خورشید بام دیگران باش

Translation

Go - be moonlight for another’s evening For a day – or two even Go be their longing Leave me in the cold rut of grief [but] Go – be sunlight for someone else’s dawning

درختی کهن

Ancient Tree

1961 - ۱۳۴۰ · p. 35 · translated 3/22/26

ancient-tree

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تک درختی کهن به سینه دشت... خسته از باد و حمله طوفان دستمالی سپید بر پنجه خواهد از لشگران باد آمان...

Translation

An ancient tree on the chest of the steppes weary of the wind & squalling onslaught A white handkerchief in his claw – Begging the armies of the wind for mercy

زندگی...

Life...

University Quarter, Tehran, 1963 - ۱۳۴۲ · p. 40

life-tune

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زندگی... یک نوا یک ترانه یک آواز یک نگه یک تبسم و یک ناز دو کبوتر دو روز در بر هم روز سوم اسیر پنجه باز. کوی دانشگاه تهران ۱۳۴۲

Translation

Life... a tone a tune a song a glance a grin & tenderness – two doves, two days in each other's arms, the third, caught in the hawk's talon.

Translator's Notes

[ناز - coy, charm, flirt]

به دخترم سایه

To my daughter Shade

1980s دهه ۱۳۶۰ · p. 48 · translated 4-29-26

shadow-daughter

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لحظه ها مثل دانه های کوچکند روی خاک خوب سبز میشوند رشد میکنند میوه می دهند. خاک خوب خاک عاشق است خاک تر خاک پرثمر...

Translation

moments are as small grains on good earth they green they grow they bear fruit. Good earth is loving earth moist earth fruitful earth…

1984 - ۱۳۶۳ · p. 50

bomb-kiss

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متن اصلی

چشمانم را بستم تا تو را عاشقانه ببوسم بمب افتاد... مرغابی ها پریدند چشم گشودم تو، در آغوش دیگری بودی... های... جنگ... ۱۳۶۳

Translation

I closed my eyes to kiss you as lovers do the bomb fell... the ducks scattered... I opened my eyes: there you were - already in another's arms ... ugh ... war

1988 - ۱۳۶۷/۲/۱۶ · p. 61

jungle-bomb

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در فاصله دریا و جنگل زنی را دوست دارم... در هر بمباران به جنگل پناه می‌برم تا در آغوشش... به دریا بیاندیشم... اصفهان ۱۳۶۷/۲/۱۶

Translation

In the space between the sea & jungle [there is] a lady [that] I love Everytime they bomb the jungle I go to the shelter of her hug Into her sea without thinking

Translator's Notes

جنگل (jangal) is rendered "forest" rather than "jungle": Jafari's recurring war-poem image is the wooded Caspian littoral, a place of refuge between the mountains and the sea. The same sea/forest pairing returns in the page-65 poem ("still the forest is bound to the sea"). The dateline places this in Isfahan, spring 1367 (May 1988), in the closing months of the Iran–Iraq war.

1988 - ۱۳۶۷/۹ · p. 62

laugh-cry

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شعرم را برای تو گفتم... خندیدی... با دیگری خواندم... گریست... ۱۳۶۷/۹

Translation

I told you my poem … You laughed … I sang another… Weeping…

Translator's Notes

The contrast turns on a single verb: گریست ("wept," third-person singular) — it is the other listener, not the poet, who weeps. So the poem you laughed at, read aloud to someone else, drew tears. Four lines, two reactions, and the whole distance between them.

1989 - ۱۳۶۸ · p. 66

soul-mold

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متن اصلی

های... جنگ... جانم را... که در فاصله... نفس‌های عاشقانه شکل می‌گیرد...؟... ۱۳۶۸

Translation

Ah struggle… Y’know my soul was molded In those distances Between a lover’s breathing

Translator's Notes

A fragment, and deliberately broken — the ellipses and the trailing "...؟..." leave the grammar unfinished. جانم را carries an object-marker (را) with no settled verb, so the line hangs: "my soul —" as something done to, or asked after. I kept the suspension rather than resolving it into a clean sentence. فاصله ("distance, gap, interval") is the same word that opens the page-61 poem; here the gap is between two breaths.

می خواهی بمان

Stay

p. 70

stay-go

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می خواهی بمان، میخواهی برو... رفتنِ تو، دل انگیز تر از آمدن دیگری ست

Translation

You wish to stay you wish to go your going is more enchanting than another’s arrival

March 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۲/۱۷ · p. 100

gone-coming

Rendered
متن اصلی

بهار می آید و تو رفته ای ای کاش ای کاش بهار رفته بود و تو می آمدی

Translation

Spring came & you had gone O but if O but if spring had gone & you were coming

April 1991 - فروردین ۱۳۷۰ · p. 127

quiet-moon

Rendered
متن اصلی

من خاموشم تا ماه... با تو... بگوید

Translation

I Am quiet Until you hear From the moon

March 1991 - کلاردشت ۱۳۷۰/۱/۴ · p. 128

heart-partridge

Rendered
متن اصلی

هزار پرنده عاشق …در سرم میخوانند …دلم کبک تنهاییست …بی حرف …سر در برف

Translation

One thousand birds of love are chanting in my head… my heart is a lone partridge… without words… snow around its head…

April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۶ · p. 131

meager-dew

Rendered
متن اصلی

هر چه دوستم داری نمیگویم کم است, کوچک ترین دانه باران بزرگترین شبنم است…

Translation

No matter how much You love me I won’t call it meager There – In the smallest grain Of rain Is the largest dew-drop

July 25 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۵/۳ · p. 149

water-cage

Rendered
متن اصلی

قفس را دادم پرنده... سبز نشد...

Translation

I watered the cage the bird... ain't no greener...

1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۸ · p. 172

tree-eyes

Rendered
متن اصلی

من درختم زرد خورشید آبی آب سبز بی‌تاب و برگ برگ چشم‌هایم پُر از شوقی ناب... ۱۳۷۵/۸

Translation

The tree in me (is) chafing green sun-glowed yellow & watery blue Leaf by leaf my eyes swollen with raw ardor...

Translator's Notes

chafe attempts to merge the dual etymologies of بی‌تاب - of heat and fidgeting

2001 - ۱۳۸۰ · p. 182 · translated 7/19/26

nightingale-cloud

Rendered
متن اصلی

هوای ابر را بلبل نداره به جز شوق گل و سنبل نداره نمی‌دونه اگه بارون نباره گل پژمرده بوی گل نداره ۱۳۸۰

Translation

Nightingale couldn't weather a cloud he only ever took a shine to hyacinth & rose he doesn't know - if the rain won't rain, the wilted rose is but a scentless rose.

Translator's Notes

The Persian is a do-baytī — a folk quatrain in colloquial speech (نداره، بارون), the register of Bābā Tāher's songs — and its first line turns on هوا: at once "weather" and "craving." The nightingale has no *havā* for clouds. No single English word holds both senses, so this translation scatters the pun across three — "weather," "took a shine," "rain won't rain." Read it aloud with a slight Irish lilt: Hiberno-English keeps "took a shine to" and "is but" in one living voice, much as the original's dialect carries its old forms unselfconsciously.

2000s - دهه ۱۳۸۰ · p. 202 · translated 05/03/2026

morning-glory

Rendered
متن اصلی

تو خاک خشک را تر کن دانه نیلوفر با باد... دهه ۱۳۸۰

Translation

you wet the dry earth morning glory seeds with the wind...

Translator's Notes

نیلوفر - water lily - but possibly also morning glory?

1990s - دهه ۱۳۷۰ · p. 203 · translated 05/3/2026

snow-beautiful

Rendered
متن اصلی

برف میبارد... برف میبارد... من پیرتر میشوم تو زیباتر... دهه ۱۳۷۰

Translation

Snow falls... Snow falls... I grow older you... more beautiful...

Work in progress — toggle the layers under each poem to compare them side by side: Machine (raw OCR) · Lantern (a working draft) · Ben (the finished translation). Empty layers are hidden.

Drafts — پیش‌نویس‌ها
Page & TitleTranslatedWritten
عنوانصفحه
22
In the sands of imagination's dried-up spring
dried-spring
1958 - بروجرد ۱۳۳۷
۲۲
در ماسه های چشمه خشکیده خیال
23-24
Almond Flowers
You are not there before my eyes,
almond-flowers
1959 - بروجرد ۱۳۳۸
۲۳–۲۴
گل های بادام
به رویم در نیستی تو
25
Swallows in the Vault of the Sky
The horizons are a warm half-light of blood —
sky-swallows
1960 - ۱۳۳۹
۲۵
پرستوها به طاق آسمونند
افق ها سایه روشن گرم خونند نمی دونی که مرغان خیالت به طاق سینه ام با درد چونند
26-27
I am that giddy, drunken waterfall
drunk-waterfall
1960 - ۱۳۳۹
۲۶–۲۷
آن آبشار سرخوش و مستم
29
These winds that blow, these leaves that creep,
blowing-winds
Tehran 1960 - تهران ۱۳۳۹
۲۹
این بادها که می وزند این برگها که می خزند
31
If the clouds allow,
longest-shadow
1960s - دهه ۱۳۴۰
۳۱
اگر ابرها بگذارند بلندترین سایه تو را
32
City of smoke,
wooden-horse
Tehran 1961 - تهران ۱۳۴۰
۳۲
شهر دود
33
You were the last sun on the roof's edge,
half-ghazal
1961 - ۱۳۴۰
۳۳
آفتاب لب بامی بودی یا طنین دل جامی بودی از دلت هیچ نگشتم آگه غزل نیمه تمامی بودی
34
On the back roads —
road-peasant
Autumn 1961, on the road to Borujerd - پاییز ۱۳۴۰ در راه بروجرد
۳۴
در کوره راه ها....
36
Dad worked for the city;
beggar-dogs
1962 - ۱۳۴۱
۳۶
بابا مأمور شهرداری بود
37
When the crystal of the moon
moon-crystal
Summer 1962, Tuyserkan - تویسرکان تابستان ۱۳۴۱
۳۷
وقتی بلور ماه
38-39
For Maryam
with-you
1963 - ۱۳۴۲
۳۸–۳۹
برای مریم
41
I love this surmise,
oldest-song
Tehran 1966 - تهران ۱۳۴۵
۴۱
دوست دارم
42
On the gallows...
lone-cross
1968 - ۱۳۴۷
۴۲
بر دارها...
43-44
The city is dark.
dark-city
1968 - ۱۳۴۷
۴۳–۴۴
شهر تاریک است،
45-46
From beside the plain,
city-smoke
1968 - ۱۳۴۷
۴۵–۴۶
از کنار دشت...
47
In the passing of the night
fifty-moons
January 1973 - تهران دی ماه ۱۳۵۱
۴۷
در عبور شب
49
Grey,
shepherd-figs
Autumn 1982 - پاییز ۱۳۶۱
۴۹
خاکستری
51
I've taken refuge under the safe canopy of a tree, and... sleep has carried me off.
green-woodpecker
Summer 1987 - تابستان ۱۳۶۶
۵۱
به چتر درختی ایمن پناه برده ام و... مرا خواب در ربوده است
52
I love you without the rain,
barren-cloud
Summer 1987 - تابستان ۱۳۶۶
۵۲
تو را دوست دارم
53
In the dark of the shore I sit and wait for you...
drink-sea
November 1987 - ۱۳۶۶/۸/۳۰
۵۳
در تاریکی ساحل در انتظارت نشسته ام...
54-55
This is the sound of horses' hooves,
horse-hooves
Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶
۵۴–۵۵
این صدای سم اسبان است
56
My heart is heavy: there is no sun in your gaze,
sunless-gaze
Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶
۵۶
دلم گرفته نگاه تو آفتابی نیست
57
Hey... I love you,
green-pond
Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶
۵۷
های... دوست دارمت
58
Ah — those half-open eyes of yours,
gray-kisses
1988 - ۱۳۶۷
۵۸
آه از چشم های نیمه باز تو
59
There is only one thing
one-thing
1988 - ۱۳۶۷
۵۹
تنها یک چیز را از تو
60
I am in the shelter,
shelter-wall
1988 - ۱۳۶۷
۶۰
من در پناهگاهم
63
You go away on a short journey.
snow-without-you
1989 - زمستان ۱۳۶۷
۶۳
تو به سفری کوتاه می‌روی
64
You are dreaming.
dotar-player
1989 - زمستان ۱۳۶۷
۶۴
خواب می‌بینی
65
The war has ended...
jungle-to-sea
1989 - اسفند ۱۳۶۷
۶۵
جنگ تمام شد...
67
When the longing takes me, I think of you.
drop-of-red
1989 - ۱۳۶۸
۶۷
وقتی دلتنگم به تو می‌اندیشم
68
Shell Shock
Shell shocked, after war...
war-delirium
1989 - ۱۳۶۸
۶۸
هذیان بعد از جنگ...
69
O you — that rain-freshened, dewy grace,
desert-moonlight
1989 - بهار ۱۳۶۸
۶۹
ای... آن پر طراوتِ بارانی
71
My head on your shoulder, a parting-air playing,
rainy-alleys
July 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۵/۱
۷۱
سَرم به شانهٔ تو با نوای هجرانی
72
Tonight
adobe-birdsong
Autumn 1989 - تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸
۷۲
امشب
73
Hey... rain...
rain-forgotten
Autumn 1989 - تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸
۷۳
های... باران...
74
I sing my paintings...
no-canvas
1990s - دههٔ ۷۰
۷۴
نقاشی‌هایم را می‌سرایم...
75
When you sing
for-whom
Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸
۷۵
وقتی تو می‌خوانی
76
In my paintings,
love-grays
Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸
۷۶
در نقاشی‌هایم
77
I said:
paint-my-voice
Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸
۷۷
گفتم
78
I am on intimate terms with the colour of cloud
old-blue
November 1989 - آبان ۱۳۶۸
۷۸
من به رنگ ابر
79-82
A Letter, Signed, to Hossein Alizadeh
That night it was raining...
letter-alizadeh
December 1989 - تهران آذر ۱۳۶۸
۷۹–۸۲
نامه‌ای با امضاء به حسین علیزاده
آن‌شب باران می‌بارید...
83
I said to my wife...
two-explosions
December 1989 - آذر ۱۳۶۸
۸۳
به همسرم گفتم...
84
I painted the bird
sara-bird
November 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۹/۱
۸۴
پرنده را با
85
No...
prison-wall
November 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۹/۷
۸۵
نَه...
86
I let my doves go
released-doves
Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸
۸۶
کبوترانم را رها می‌کنم
87
Yalda Night... a Night of Parting...
What a night that night was...
yalda-night
Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸
۸۷
شب یلدا... هجرانی...
چه شبی بود آن شب...
88
The gray of your gaze
gray-gaze
Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸
۸۸
خاکستریِ نگاهِ تو
89
Hey... I love you...
river-city
Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸
۸۹
های... تو را دوست دارم...
90
My studio...
winter-studio
December 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۹/۲۷
۹۰
کارگاهم...
91
Rain,
rain-complaint
Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸
۹۱
باران،
92
Seen through the lattice of your eyes
fifty-springs
January 1991 - دی ماه ۱۳۶۹
۹۲
از مشبکِ چشمانت
93
If the square of your laughter were not there,
square-laughter
December 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۶
۹۳
اگر مربع خنده‌های تو نباشد
94
Out of the night of your two eyes
wounded-deer
January 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۱۹
۹۴
از شبِ دو چشم تو
95
All winter long...
my-rain
January 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۲۰
۹۵
در تمامِ زمستان...
96
Let me rise
moon-lantern
February 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۲
۹۶
برخیزم
97
From behind the bridge,
oldest-bridge
February 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۱
۹۷
از پشتِ پُل،
98
I said: I know three plants in the desert...
three-plants
February 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۵
۹۸
گفتم سه گیاه را در کویر می‌شناسم...
99
I will never have my fill of you...
osman-saz
February 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۹
۹۹
من از تو سیر نخواهم شد...
101
Out of an ardour to grow
water-trap
1990 - ۱۳۶۹
۱۰۱
به شوقِ روییدن
102-103
With the bow and arrow of my childhood,
sparrow-hunter
1990 - ۱۳۶۹
۱۰۲–۱۰۳
با تیر و کمان کودکی‌ام
104-105
My love... look again —
look-again
Spring 1990 - بهار ۱۳۶۹
۱۰۴–۱۰۵
جانا... دوباره نگاه کن
106
I have to paint...
unfinished-manes
March 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱
۱۰۶
من باید نقاشی کنم...
107
We have begun Nowruz from the night...
nowruz-night
March 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱
۱۰۷
نوروز را از شب آغاز کرده‌ایم...
108-109
One of my doves does not come back,
not-having
April 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱۷
۱۰۸–۱۰۹
یکی از کبوترانم برنمی‌گردد،
110
Always the doves
doves-know
May 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۲/۱۲
۱۱۰
همیشه کبوتران
111
My longest breath, a cloud...
longest-breath
June 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹
۱۱۱
بلندترین نَفَسم، ابری...
112
My ears astonished at seeing...
paint-song
June 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹
۱۱۲
گوش‌هایم در حیرتِ دیدن...
113
Onto the tall stalk of longing
graft-longing
August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۵/۲۶
۱۱۳
بر ساقهٔ بلندِ تمنا
114
Longing for a Song
You said:
song-lamp
August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۶/۳
۱۱۴
دلتنگی برای آواز
گفتی...
115
After the war
every-fire
August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۶/۷
۱۱۵
بعد از جنگ
116
With the kind rope of your looking
sewn-lips
1991 - زمستان ۱۳۶۹
۱۱۶
با ریسمانِ مهربانِ نگاهِ تو...
117
Calm in my looking...
nadir-zenith
December 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۳
۱۱۷
در نگاهم آرام...
118
On the blackest nights,
kind-gaze
December 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶
۱۱۸
در سیاه‌ترین شب‌ها،
119
On the mud walls of my childhood,
childhood-walls
December 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶
۱۱۹
بر چینه‌های کودکی‌ام
120
Fifty years now
snow-turtledove
January 1991 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۱۹
۱۲۰
پنجاه سال است
121
How Did the Sixties Pass for Me?
The Sixties —
sixties-roots
1991 - بهمن ۱۳۶۹
۱۲۱
دههٔ شصت بر من چگونه گذشت؟
دههٔ شصت را...
122
Rain is not always for growing...
restless-cloud
March 1991 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۲/۲۴
۱۲۲
همیشه باران
123
It was the heart of the night, and rain, and moonlight;
fire-water
1990s - دههٔ ۱۳۷۰
۱۲۳
دلِ شب بود و باران بود و مهتاب
124
One man,
memory-dust
1990s - دههٔ ۱۳۷۰
۱۲۴
یک مرد،
125
O silent patient one,
mirror-pool
1991 - ۱۳۷۰
۱۲۵
اِی ساکتِ صبور
126
Eight years
dove-apprentice
1991 - فروردین ۱۳۷۰
۱۲۶
هشت سال...
129
I looked at you again...
voice-colours
April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳
۱۲۹
تو را دوباره نگاه کردم...
130
I was passing through,
ear-embrace
April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳
۱۳۰
عبور می‌کردم...
132
How short it looks,
highest-peak
April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۲۹
۱۳۲
چه کوتاه می‌نماید
133-134
Nights,
village-nights
April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۳۱
۱۳۳-۱۳۴
شب‌ها
135
You count
counting-years
May 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۲/۱۲
۱۳۵
تو سال‌های زندگی را
136
On the night of the earthquake
earthquake-firefly
1991 - زلزله رودبار ۱۳۷۰
۱۳۶
در شبِ زلزله...
137
A dove in the rain,
two-shadows
November 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۹/۵
۱۳۷
کبوتر در باران...
138
O passing cloud —
passing-cloud
April 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹
۱۳۸
ای ابرِ عابر...
139
O cloud —
without-moonlight
April 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹
۱۳۹
ای ابر...
140
The scent of the white jasmine —
white-jasmine
1992 - تیر ۱۳۷۱
۱۴۰
بوی یاسِ سپید را
141
The flower in the greenhouse loses the season,
glass-greenhouse
September 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۷/۶
۱۴۱
گل در گلخانه فصل را گم می‌کند،
142
When the cage broke,
broken-cage
1993 - ۱۳۷۲
۱۴۲
وقتی قفس شکست...
143
A gardener does not teach the plant
gardener-seed
1993 - در کارگاه حجم سبز ۱۳۷۲
۱۴۳
باغبان، سبز شدن را،
144
Drive the black cloud of worry
seize-moment
May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲
۱۴۴
ابرِ سیاهِ دغدغه را
145
clouds became dew...
dew-deer
May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲
۱۴۵
ابر شبنم شد....
146
My father sang at the foot of the fire.
father-fire
May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۶
۱۴۶
پدرم پای آتش آواز خواند...
147
My father
father-silences
June 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۳/۱۶
۱۴۷
پدرم...
148
A flower under my feet,
old-stalk
August 1993 - محمودآباد ۱۳۷۲/۵/۲۱
۱۴۸
زیر پایم گُل...
150-151
Perhaps this nightingale that is singing is me,
walnut-leaf
August 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۶/۳
۱۵۰-۱۵۱
شاید این بلبل که می‌خواند منم
152
Planted in the soil of your sorrow,
shadowless-leaf
September 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۶/۲۶
۱۵۲
به خاکِ غمَت نشانده‌ام...
153
The dove in the cage
cage-song
1994 - ۱۳۷۳
۱۵۳
کبوتر
154
Why
between-explosions
1994 - ۱۳۷۳
۱۵۴
چرا...
155
I will never have my fill of you —
never-sated
1994 - بهار ۱۳۷۳
۱۵۵
من از تو سیر نخواهم شد....
156
The tree and I,
tree-belief
April 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۱/۱۶
۱۵۶
من و درخت
157
On purpose... by chance...
chance-purpose
June 1994 - ۱۳۷۳/۴/۵
۱۵۷
عمداً... به اتفاق...
158
How am I to bring this night to morning
night-morning
September 1994 - ۱۳۷۳/۶/۲۲
۱۵۸
شب را
159
Think of me as earth —
muslin-memory
1994 - آذر ۱۳۷۳
۱۵۹
پندار خاکم...
160
Sleep — a sea, mist-laden, perfumed,
shell-sleep
1995 - ۱۳۷۴
۱۶۰
خواب... دریای... مه آلودِ... معطر،
161
Ah, tonight
moonlit-glass
April 1995 - ۱۳۷۴/۱/۲۲
۱۶۱
آه امشب...
162
At the door of old age
old-door
August 1995 - ۱۳۷۴/۵/۲۷
۱۶۲
من پشتِ درِ پیری
163
Freedom Behind Closed Doors
Freedom, behind a shut door,
freedom-doors
February 1996 - ۱۳۷۴/۱۱/۲۴
۱۶۳
آزادی پشتِ درهای بسته...
آزادی پشتِ دری بسته...
164
You can be played like a barbat,
barbat-gazelle
1996 - ۱۳۷۵
۱۶۴
می‌شود تو را...
165-166
The kindness of the kind man
coloured-stones
1996 - تهران، خرداد ۱۳۷۵
۱۶۵-۱۶۶
مهر مردِ مهربان
167
I stayed so long,
wet-cheeks
1996 - تابستان ۱۳۷۵
۱۶۷
آنقدر ماندم...
168
The smallest bird taught me
no-time
July 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۴/۱۱
۱۶۸
کوچک‌ترین پرنده به من آموخت...
169-170
O my sorrowing self —
friends-cloud
1996 - شهریور ۱۳۷۵
۱۶۹-۱۷۰
ای منِ محزون...
171
I want to be with you
no-wall
September 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۶/۲۲
۱۷۱
دوست دارم با تو باشم...
173
Open your lips —
open-lips
November 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۸/۱۷
۱۷۳
لب باز کن...
174
Let me rise
turquoise-mirror
February 1997 - تهران ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۳
۱۷۴
برخیزم
175
we didn't go
well-doves
February 1997 - ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۶
۱۷۵
ما نرفتیم...
176
The house went quiet.
empty-house
April 1997 - ۱۳۷۶/۱/۲۱
۱۷۶
خانه خلوت شد...
177
In every look,
every-look
July 1997 - ۱۳۷۶/۵/۷
۱۷۷
در هر نگاه...
178
The longing of one raindrop toward the grass,
new-year
March 1998 - ۱۳۷۶/۱۲/۲۸
۱۷۸
شوقِ یک قطرهٔ باران به چمن،
179
in traveling...
destination-going
1998 - تهران ۱۳۷۷
۱۷۹
در سفر
180
My ear is hearing a murmur
murmur-ear
1999 - ۱۳۷۸
۱۸۰
گوشِ من زمزمه‌ای می‌شنود...
181
I was in love with the instrument, with song.
unsung-songs
2000 - تهران ۱۳۷۹
۱۸۱
عاشق ساز آواز بودم
183
Sixty years
childhood-road
2001 - فروردین ۱۳۸۰
۱۸۳
شصت سال
184-185
For as long as I can remember her
mother-tenderness
May 2001 - ۱۳۸۰/۲/۲۶
۱۸۴-۱۸۵
تا یاد دارمش...
186
And after that
rain-cypress
November 2002 - ۱۳۸۱/۹/۷
۱۸۶
و از آن پس...
187
The longing of a star
flickering-star
2003 - ۱۳۸۲
۱۸۷
شوقِ ستاره‌ای که...
188
The morning light of your throat shone into my ear
free-song
2003 - تهران ۱۳۸۲
۱۸۸
بگوشم نور صبح حنجرت تابید
189
Be a willow.
be-willow
February 2004 - ۱۳۸۲/۱۱/۱۵
۱۸۹
بید باش...
190
Sixty years went by.
desert-thirst
2004 - تهران ۱۳۸۳
۱۹۰
شصت سال گذشت
191
The fault lay with the thread of the water
water-thread
2004 - ۱۳۸۳
۱۹۱
گناه از نَخِ آب بود
192
The moment went past me
millipede-moment
2005 - تهران ۱۳۸۴
۱۹۲
لحظه با شتاب
193
You said: lean on me,
leaves-roots
2005 - تهران، بهار ۱۳۸۴
۱۹۳
گفتی به من تکیه کن
194
The house, remembering you, is full of moonlight.
moonlit-house
March 2005 - ۱۳۸۴/۱/۷
۱۹۴
خانه با یادِ تو مهتابی‌ست...
195
Ask my eyes
mirror-chance
2005 - ۱۳۸۴/۴
۱۹۵
نشانی شوق را...
196
When a dervish is distracted,
dervish-road
2006 - پاییز ۱۳۸۵
۱۹۶
وقتی که درویشی پریشان است
197
Until you reach the rose-garden, the soul is not set free.
transparent-angels
2007 - زمستان ۱۳۸۵
۱۹۷
تا به گلستان نرسی / روح رها نمی‌شود
198
In your snow-filled lane
snow-shadow
2008 - زمستان ۱۳۸۶
۱۹۸
در کوچهٔ پر برف تو
199
I am the feel of the rain striking my own earth.
wounded-gazelle
2008 - زمستان ۱۳۸۶
۱۹۹
من احساس برخورد باران به خاکم

1958 - بروجرد ۱۳۳۷ · p. 22

dried-spring

متن اصلی

در ماسه های چشمه خشکیده خیال چون ریشه مانده ای و نمی رویی از زمین شاخی نمی کنی که دمی غنچه امید در قلب دور مانده از شادی م وا شود برگی نمی کنی که دمی سایه ای کند این دل از تیرهای جگرسوز آفتاب یک دم رها شود. این موی ریشه های تو چون مار زخم دار دیوانه وار میدود و می دواندم در شوره زار داغ تنم تاب می خورد آنگه به سوی ساغر می میکشاندم آنقدر میخورم کز هوش میروم ای ساقه امید مردم در انتظار نیش خدنگ جوانه ات از خاک شعله برکش و چون سالهای پیش سر کن ترانه ات ای اشکهای کوچک پرشادی بهار من بغض خاموشم مردم در انتظار بروجرد ۱۳۳۷

Machine

In the sands of the dried spring, the imagination is like a root and does not grow. You do not make a branch from the ground that will eventually blossom. A bud of hope in the heart that is far from happiness. You do not make a leaf that will eventually create a shadow. This heart is free from the burning rays of the sun. This hair of your roots Like a wounded snake I would run and run like crazy My body sways in the hot salt marsh Then I would pull it towards the ocean I would eat so much that I would lose consciousness O stem of hope People are waiting for the sting of the mongoose of your bud Rise a flame from the soil and, like in the past years Sing your song O small tears of spring joy I am a silent grudge, people are waiting Borojerd 1337

Lantern

In the sands of imagination's dried-up spring you have stayed like a root and will not grow from the earth. You put out no branch on which, for an instant, a bud of hope might open in this heart kept far from joy; you put out no leaf to cast a moment's shade, so that this heart, from the liver-scorching arrows of the sun, might for one breath go free. This hair of your roots, like a wounded snake, runs wild and sets me running, writhing in the hot salt-flat of my body, then drags me toward the wine-cup — and I drink until I lose my senses. O stalk of hope: I died waiting for the arrow-sting of your sprouting. Draw up a flame from the soil and, as in years gone by, strike up your song. O little tears, brimming with the joy of spring — I am the silent sob; I died, waiting. Borujerd, 1337

گل های بادام

Almond Flowers

1959 - بروجرد ۱۳۳۸ · p. 23-24

almond-flowers

متن اصلی

به رویم در نیستی تو ز پهلویم نرستی تو چو غم در دل نشستی تو نمی دانم چه هستی تو. نه از آبی نه از خاکی نه از طوفان و کولاکی به دل آوای غمناکی نمی دانم چه هستی تو. به بام آسمان برفی درون قلب شنگرفی به چشم اشک و به لب حرفی نمی دانم چه هستی تو. تو چون گلهای بادامی شقایق های بر بامی طنینی از دل جامی نمیدانم چه هستی تو. تو ناقوس کلیسایی از آن مغرب مایی به هر قلبی یک آوایی نمی دانم چه هستی تو پرستوی بهار من امید من قرار من ز خود راه فرار من نمیدانم چه هستی تو. به هر راهی تو پوینده ز هر دردی تو جوینده به هر لفظی تو گوینده نمیدانم چه هستی تو. به جز راهت نمی پویم به جز وصلت نمیجویم اگر چه فاش میگویم نمیدانم چه هستی تو. بروجرد ۱۳۳۸

Machine

You are not in front of me, you have not come to my side, you have sat in my heart like sorrow, I do not know what you are. Not from water, not from earth, not from storm and blizzard, in the heart of a sad voice, I do not know what you are. On the roof of the snowy sky, in the heart of a thorn, with tears in my eyes and words on my lips, I do not know what you are. You are like almond flowers, poppies on the roof, resounding from the heart of a cup, I do not know what you are. You are a church bell from our west. I don't know what you are with every heart, a single sound My spring swallow, my hope, my destiny, my escape from myself, I don't know what you are. You are the one who follows every path, you are the one who seeks every pain, you are the one who speaks every word, I don't know what you are. I don't follow except your path, I don't seek except union, even though I say it openly, I don't know what you are. Borujerd 1338

Lantern

You are not there before my eyes, you did not grow from my own side, yet like grief you've settled in my heart — I do not know what you are. Not of water, not of earth, not of the storm or the blizzard; a mournful voice within the heart — I do not know what you are. Snow on the roof of the sky, vermilion deep in the heart, a tear in the eye, a word on the lip — I do not know what you are. You are like the almond blossoms, poppies along a rooftop, a ringing from the heart of a cup — I do not know what you are. You are a church bell out of that West of ours, a single voice in every heart — I do not know what you are. My swallow of spring, my hope, my one repose, my road of escape from myself — I do not know what you are. On every road, you are the one who strides; out of every sorrow, the one who searches; in every word, the one who speaks — I do not know what you are. I walk no road but yours, I seek nothing but your embrace, and though I say it plainly — I do not know what you are. Borujerd, 1338

پرستوها به طاق آسمونند

Swallows in the Vault of the Sky

1960 - ۱۳۳۹ · p. 25

sky-swallows

متن اصلی

افق ها سایه روشن گرم خونند نمی دونی که مرغان خیالت به طاق سینه ام با درد چونند ۱۳۳۹

Machine

The horizons are bright, warm shadows. Don't you know that the birds of your imagination are pecking in pain at the vault of my chest 1339

Lantern

The horizons are a warm half-light of blood — don't you know how the birds of your memory beat in pain against the vault of my chest? 1339

1960 - ۱۳۳۹ · p. 26-27

drunk-waterfall

متن اصلی

آن آبشار سرخوش و مستم که سال ها بر ماسه های گرم تنت اشک ریختم دیوانه وار تا که بمیرم به دامنت از دام برفهای سپیدم گریختم وقتی شراب شیشه خورشید می چکید برق تنم به تندی تیر نگاه بود وقتی نگاه آینه مهر میشکست امواج سینه ام به سپیدی ماه بود افیون بادهای سحر پیکر مرا بی تاب مینمود در آغوش بسترم هر شاخه میگرفت به بازی تن مرا هر برگ می گذشت به آسانی از سرم... در تلخی زمانه چو شور تو داشتم چون شهد مینمود مرا انتظار تو می سوختم از گرمی آغوش این خیال دریای من تو بودی و من آبشار تو اکنون که در برابر من موج میزنی از خواب پر فریب تو بیدار میشوم تو مست و شاد از نگه آسمان و من در ساحل خموش تو در شن فرو روم تابوت استخوانی سینه چو گور تنگ در هم فشرده لاشه سرد غرور من میگریم ای دریغ چرا نیستم باز... من برف دره ها و تو دریای دور من ۱۳۳۹

Machine

That happy and drunk waterfall that for years I shed tears on the warm sands of your body Like a madman Until I die in your lap I escaped from the trap of my white snow When the wine dripped from the glass of the sun The lightning of my body was as swift as a glance When the look of the mirror of the seal broke, the waves of my chest were as white as the moon, the opium of the dawn winds made my body impatient in the embrace of my bed, every branch took my body to play with Every leaf passed easily over my head... In the bitterness of time, I was as thirsty as you, as if you were nectar, I was waiting for you, I was burning with the warmth of the embrace of this dream of my sea, you were and I am your waterfall, now that you are waving in front of me, I wake up from your deceptive sleep, you are drunk and happy from the hold of the sky and I sink into the sand on your silent shore A coffin of bones, a chest like a narrow grave The cold carcass of my pride, compressed together We cry, oh my goodness Why am I not here again... I am the snow of the valleys and In the sea far away from me 1339

Lantern

I am that giddy, drunken waterfall who for years wept onto the warm sands of your body, wild with madness, and to die at last in your lap fled the snare of my own white snows. When the wine dripped from the sun's glass the lightning of my body was quick as a darted glance. When the gaze in love's mirror shattered, the waves of my chest ran moon-white; the opium of the dawn winds left my body restless; in the embrace of my bed each branch took me up to play, and every leaf passed lightly over my head... In the bitterness of the times I held your fever like a passion; waiting for you tasted to me like honey; I burned in the warmth of this dream's embrace. You were my sea and I your waterfall. Now that you surge before me I wake from your beguiling sleep — you, drunk and glad with the sky's regard, and I, on your silent shore, sinking into the sand. The chest a coffin of bone, like a cramped grave, the cold carcass of my pride pressed flat within it. I weep — what a pity — why am I no longer... I, the snow of the valleys, and you, my far-off sea? 1339

Tehran 1960 - تهران ۱۳۳۹ · p. 29

blowing-winds

متن اصلی

این بادها که می وزند این برگها که می خزند این بوی نم کشیده دیوارهای باغ این پیچ و تاب مضطرب بالهای زاغ این عطر نیم خفته که در شیشه فضا از لاشه های وحشی باران چکیده است این بادهای مست وقتی که می وزند با شدتی که سینه گنجشک میزند با سرعتی که سایه یک عنکبوت کور بر سقف خانه ام شبح تار میتند دردی درون سینه من تاب میخورد یک درد ناشناس از سالهای دور با جانم آشناست. این بادها که می وزند این برگها که می خزند تهران ۱۳۳۹

Machine

These winds that blow, these leaves that crawl This damp smell of the garden walls This anxious twist of the raven's wings, this half-asleep perfume that has dripped from the wild carcasses of the rain in the glass of space These drunken winds When they blow With the intensity of a sparrow's chest With the speed of a blind spider's shadow A shadow looms on the roof of my house A pain swings inside my chest An unknown pain is familiar to my soul from distant years. These winds that blow, these leaves that crawl Tehran 1339

Lantern

These winds that blow, these leaves that creep, this damp smell off the garden walls, this anxious writhing of the rook's wings, this half-sleeping scent that, in the glass of the air, has dripped from the wild carcasses of the rain — these drunken winds, when they blow, with the force of a sparrow's beating breast, with the speed at which a blind spider's shadow spins a dim phantom on my roof — a pain turns over inside my chest: an unknown ache, from far-off years, that my soul already knows. These winds that blow, these leaves that creep. Tehran 1339

1960s - دهه ۱۳۴۰ · p. 31

longest-shadow

متن اصلی

اگر ابرها بگذارند بلندترین سایه تو را چون باغچه ای گل خواهم ..کاشت و.... فصل نورت را .... آیه آیه... بر حجم تاریکی خواهم نشاند.... اگر ابرها بگذارند کوتاه ترین سایه مردی را که حاکم است و ظلم میکند با تیر به زمین خواهم دوخت آن گاه... بلندترین سایه تو را که خوبی... که ساده ای چون باغچه ای گل خواهم کاشت .... مهربانی را با خون آب خواهم داد. اگر ابرها بگذارند. دهه ۱۳۴۰

Machine

If the clouds leave your longest shadow I will plant flowers like a garden And.... the season of your light.... verse by verse... I will plant it on the volume of darkness.... If the clouds leave I will nail the shortest shadow of a man who rules and oppresses to the ground with an arrow Then... Your longest shadow, who is good... who is simple I will plant flowers like a garden ... I will water kindness with blood. If the clouds leave. 1960s

Lantern

If the clouds allow, your longest shadow I'll plant like a bed of flowers, and your season of light, verse by verse, I'll set against the bulk of the darkness... If the clouds allow, the shortest shadow of the man who rules and tyrannizes I'll pin to the ground with an arrow. Then... your longest shadow — you who are good, who are simple — I'll plant like a bed of flowers... I'll water kindness with blood. If the clouds allow. 1340s

Tehran 1961 - تهران ۱۳۴۰ · p. 32

wooden-horse

متن اصلی

شهر دود شهر داد شهر بی داد شهر نیش شهر نوش شهر شب گرفته خاموش در شهر دود کودکی را دیدم نامش رستم بود خسته و سوار بر اسب چوبین شکسته می خواند من میترسم... می ترسم... می ترسم چوب گزینم کو... و مادرش صدا میزد های رستم درست را بخوان رستم درس خواند رستم مرد شد... و از اسب چوبینش میزی ساختند. تهران ۱۳۴۰

Machine

City of Smoke City of Dad City of Nod City of Nish City of Drink City of Silence in the Night In the City of Smoke I saw a child His name was Rostam Tired and riding a broken wooden horse He was singing I am afraid... I am afraid... I am afraid I will choose a stick... And his mother was calling Hey Rostam, sing the right song Rostam studied Rostam became a man... And they made a table out of his wooden horse. Tehran 1961

Lantern

City of smoke, city of justice, city of injustice, city of the sting, city of the sweet draught, city gone silent, taken by night. In the city of smoke I saw a child whose name was Rostam, tired, astride a broken wooden horse, and he was singing: I'm afraid... afraid... afraid... where is my whittled stick...? And his mother kept calling, Rostam, sing it right — so Rostam learned his lesson, Rostam became a man... and out of his wooden horse they built a desk. Tehran, 1340

1961 - ۱۳۴۰ · p. 33

half-ghazal

متن اصلی

آفتاب لب بامی بودی یا طنین دل جامی بودی از دلت هیچ نگشتم آگه غزل نیمه تمامی بودی ۱۳۴۰

Machine

Were you the sun on the roof or the echo of the heart in a cup? I didn't say anything from your heart, but you were a half-finished ghazal. 1340

Lantern

You were the last sun on the roof's edge, or the ringing deep in a cup — I never learned a thing of your heart: you were a ghazal left half-finished. 1340

Autumn 1961, on the road to Borujerd - پاییز ۱۳۴۰ در راه بروجرد · p. 34

road-peasant

متن اصلی

در کوره راه ها.... آبی خاکستری سیاه پیکر دهقانی است با چوبدست بلندش سپید سیاه خرش را میگویم با خرواری از خارهای باران زده سیاه سیاه بختش را میگویم که همچون سایه از کنار پاهایش روییده است. پاییز ۱۳۴۰ در راه بروجرد

Machine

In the furnace of the roads.... Blue, gray, black The figure of a peasant with his long staff White, black I speak of the bull With a heap of thorns, rain-swept Black, black I speak of his luck That, like a shadow has grown from his feet. Autumn 1340 on the road to Borujerd

Lantern

On the back roads — blue, grey, black — stands the figure of a peasant with his long staff, white and black: I mean his donkey, loaded down with a ton of rain-beaten thorns, black, black: I mean his fortune, which, like a shadow, has grown up out of the sides of his feet. Autumn 1340, on the road to Borujerd

1962 - ۱۳۴۱ · p. 36

beggar-dogs

متن اصلی

بابا مأمور شهرداری بود پا با سنگها را میکشت یک روز آفتابی بابا با یک تکه گوشت زهر آلود در تعقیب سگی بود... بچه گداها بازی میکردند بچه گداها با سگ بازی میکردند سگ گوشت را نخورد بچه گداها خوردند. بچه گداها مردند. بابا دید بابا خندید بابا قاتل بود با با گوشت خورد بابا مرد... من نصف حقوق بابا را از شهرداری میگرفتم من درس خواندم من شهردار شدم من سگ ها را نمی کشم من سگ ها را عقیم میکنم شاید بچه گداها عقیم شوند. نشریه نامه دانشجو دانشگاه تهران (۱۳۴۱)

Machine

Dad was a municipal official He used to beat stones One sunny day Dad He was chasing a dog with a piece of poisoned meat... The beggar children were playing The beggar children were playing with the dog The dog did not eat the meat The beggar children did. The beggar children died. Dad saw Dad laughed Dad was a murderer He ate the meat Dad died... I used to get half of Dad's salary from the municipality I studied I became the mayor I do not kill dogs I sterilize dogs Maybe the beggar children will be sterilized. Tehran University Student's Newsletter (1962)

Lantern

Dad worked for the city; he was the one who killed the dogs. One sunny day Dad went out after a stray with a scrap of poisoned meat... The beggar children were playing, the beggar children were playing with the dog. The dog wouldn't eat the meat. The beggar children ate it. The beggar children died. Dad saw. Dad laughed. Dad was a murderer. Dad ate the meat. Dad died... I drew half of Dad's wages from the city. I studied. I became mayor. I don't kill the dogs — I sterilize the dogs. Maybe the beggar children will be sterilized too. Tehran University Student Newsletter, 1341

Summer 1962, Tuyserkan - تویسرکان تابستان ۱۳۴۱ · p. 37

moon-crystal

متن اصلی

وقتی بلور ماه در چشمه ها شکست.... وقتی شب سیاه.... در غارها و سایه گهارها نشست.... وقتی که مرغ شب... ابریشم نوای دل آویز خویش را .... بر پیله طلایی صدها ستاره بست من از نشیب دره بسوی تو میدوم با اسب راهوار... لرزان و بی قرار دیوانه وار می پرم از سنگچین رود. تا در کنار چشمه نمانی به انتظار تویسرکان تابستان ۱۳۴۱ برای مریم

Machine

When the moon crystal broke in the springs.... When the black night.... Sat in the caves and shadows of the caves.... When the night bird... The silk of its heart-rending song.... It tied hundreds of stars to the golden cocoon I run towards you from the valley slope On a walking horse... Shaking and restless I jump like a madman from the river's cobblestones. So that you don't stay by the spring, waiting Twiserkan, summer 1341 For Maryam

Lantern

When the crystal of the moon shattered in the springs... when the black night settled into the caves and their shadowed hollows... when the bird of night bound the silk of its beguiling song to the golden cocoon of a hundred stars — I come running to you down the valley's slope on a swift-paced horse, trembling, unable to rest, leaping like a madman over the river's stepping-stones, so you won't be left waiting by the spring. Tuyserkan, summer 1341 For Maryam

1963 - ۱۳۴۲ · p. 38-39

with-you

متن اصلی

برای مریم تا تو با منی گل برای من گل است. شب برای من شب است سبزه... سبزه است. برف ها برای من ژاله های خفته اند آبهای مرده اند ابرهای سال خورده اند. کوه ها برای من دوانتهای دره اند. تا تو با منی آسمان برای من... راه آبی پرنده است. گریه خاک خیس دانه های خنده است. تا تو با منی... رنگ برف ها سپید و رنگ ابرها کبود. تا تو با منی... ابر رنگ ابر دارد و.... دود رنگ دود بی تو زندگی چه سود. بی تو... روزها و.... برف ها و..... ابرها و.... شام ها.... نه سپیدشان سپید... نه کبودشان کبود... نه سیاهشان سیاه.... بی تو آسمان پاک سینه ام..... کهکشان هر ستاره گناه تو برای من... مثل جیوه ای برای آینه..... بی تو شیشه ام..... بی تو عمق من... پر از تهیست.... بی تو در کویر بهت من سراب نیست.... بی تو زندگی برای من سراب... بی تو نقش من بر آب... بی تو سرب سایه ها درون من مذاب.... سوز آه من... این کبوتر غمین گمشده... روی بام حنجرم به خون نشسته است.... خون خاموشی... در رگ ترانه های من لخته بسته است.... بی تو... شام ها و برف ها و ابرها..... نه... سیاهشان سیاه... نه... سپیدشان سپید... نه... کبودشان کبود بی تو زندگی چه سود ۱۳۴۲

Machine

For Maryam As long as you are with me Flowers are flowers for me. Night is night for me Greenery... is greenery. Snows are for me Sleeping dewdrops Dead waters Clouds are old. Mountains are the ends of valleys for me. As long as you are with me The sky is for me... The blue path of birds. The cry of wet soil is the seeds of laughter. As long as you are with me... The color of snow is white and the color of clouds is blue. As long as you are with me... Clouds are the color of clouds and....smoke is the color of smoke What good is life without you? Without you...days and....snows and..... Clouds and....evenings... Neither their white is white... Neither their blue is blue... nor their black is black... Without you, the sky is pure in my chest..... The galaxy of every star is sin You are to me... like mercury for a mirror..... Without you, I am glass..... Without you, my depth... is full of emptiness.... Without you, in the desert, there is no mirage for me.... Without you, life is a mirage for me... Without you, my footprint on the water... Without you, the lead of the shadows inside me is molten.... My burning ah... This dove of sorrow is lost... The roof of my throat is filled with blood.... The blood of silence... A clot has formed in the veins of my songs.... Without you... The evenings and the snows and the clouds..... No... their black is black... No... their white is white... No... their blue is blue Without you, what is the use of life 1342

Lantern

For Maryam As long as you are with me a flower, to me, is a flower. Night, to me, is night. Green grass... is green grass. The snows, to me, are sleeping dew, are dead waters, are aged clouds. Mountains, to me, are the two ends of the valley. As long as you are with me the sky, to me, is... the blue road of the bird. The weeping of the wet earth is the seed of laughter. As long as you are with me... the color of snow is white, the color of clouds is blue. As long as you are with me... cloud wears the color of cloud, and... smoke the color of smoke. Without you, what good is life? Without you... the days, and... the snows, and... the clouds, and... the evenings... their white is not white, their blue not blue, their black not black. Without you the sky of my chest is bare... a galaxy where every star is a sin. You are to me like the quicksilver to a mirror... without you I am only glass. Without you my depths are brimming with emptiness... without you, in the desert of my stupor, there is not even a mirage... without you life is a mirage to me... without you my image is drawn on water... without you the lead of the shadows runs molten inside me... The burning of my sigh, this lost and grieving dove, has settled in blood on the roof of my throat... the blood of silence has clotted in the veins of my songs... Without you... the evenings, the snows, the clouds... no — their black not black... no — their white not white... no — their blue not blue. Without you, what good is life? 1342

Tehran 1966 - تهران ۱۳۴۵ · p. 41

oldest-song

متن اصلی

دوست دارم این گمان این سرود سالخورد جاودان این سرشته فرشته های آسمان این یقین این کهن ترین ترانه زمین مثل رنگ ابر مثل بوی خاک مثل طعم اشک مثل خواب کوه ها.... همیشگی ست... تهران ۱۳۴۵

Machine

I love This thought This song of eternal aging This nature of the angels of heaven This certainty This oldest song of the earth Like the color of the clouds Like the smell of the soil Like the taste of tears Like the sleep of the mountains.... It is eternal... Tehran 1966

Lantern

I love this surmise, this aged, undying anthem, this thing kneaded from the angels of the sky, this certainty, this oldest song of the earth. Like the color of cloud, like the smell of earth, like the taste of tears, like the sleep of mountains... it goes on forever... Tehran 1345

1968 - ۱۳۴۷ · p. 42

lone-cross

متن اصلی

بر دارها... خطّی و آونگی... و نسیمی که بوی لاشه‌ها را... تا... دهن‌درّهٔ کفتارها می‌بُرد... و باد می‌آمد... و... باد می‌آمد... آنقدر تند که... کفتارها مرد مصلوب را... با موهای بلندش نشناختند... آنگاه باد... صلیبِ تنها را از روی تپه بُرد... ۱۳۴۷

Machine

On the gallows... linear, and pendulous... and a breeze that was carrying the smell of the carcasses... to... the yawning mouths of the hyenas... And the wind was coming... and... the wind was coming... so hard that... the hyenas did not know the crucified man... by his long hair... And then the wind... carried the lone cross off the hill... 1347

Lantern

On the gallows... linear, and pendulous... and a breeze that was carrying the smell of the carcasses to... the yawning mouths of the hyenas... And the wind came... and... the wind came... so hard that the hyenas did not know the crucified man by his long hair... And then the wind carried the lone cross off the hill... 1347

Translator's Notes

خطّی و آونگی — *linear, and pendulous.* Before the poem will say what is hanging there, it says what a painter sees: a line, and a weight swinging from it. That refusal to name the bodies for two lines is the whole method of the poem, and the reason the horror arrives when it does. دهن‌درّه is a *yawn* — literally a tearing-open of the mouth. The breeze carries the smell of the carcasses not to the hyenas' jaws but to their yawning, which is worse: they are bored. And when the wind rises hard enough, what they fail to do is *recognise* the crucified man by his long hair — مصلوب and صلیب put a crucifixion in a book that otherwise has none, so the long hair invites the reading it invites. The wind finishes the job the hyenas could not, and carries the empty cross off the hill.

1968 - ۱۳۴۷ · p. 43-44

dark-city

متن اصلی

شهر تاریک است، کوچه‌های خسته در هذیانِ خواب‌آلود می‌سوزد... چشمِ شهر از دود می‌سوزد... شهربانان آتشی افروخته با بوته‌های جهل آتشی که گفته‌اند... این نورِ جاوید است... جاودانه آتشِ بیدار خورشید است... و... دروغی را که باید کرد باور... خنجرِ رنجی‌ست، جان از این معنا که ما با رنج می‌سازیم... می‌سوزد جز دلِ سنگینِ دژخیمان هرچه در آتش می‌اندازیم می‌سوزد... موسِمِ خواری‌ست... موسمی که معنی فریاد آشوب است... غنچه‌ها می‌پژمرد در سردی دل‌ها... و...گلِ فریاد بر لب‌ها نمی‌روید... موسِمِ خواری‌ست... هر که بر لب قفل دارد دست‌هایش شاخ پرباری‌ست. شهر... دشتِ تشنه را مانَد آب می‌خواهد... شهربانِ پیر اما... شهریان را خواب می‌خواهد... ۱۳۴۷

Machine

The city is dark The tired streets in sleepy delirium Burns... The eyes of the city burn with smoke. The city guards have lit a fire With the bushes of ignorance The fire that they have said... This is the eternal light... The eternal fire is the awakened sun... .... Believe the lie that must be told The dagger of suffering. The soul, in the sense that We build with suffering... burns Except for the heavy hearts of our murderers Whatever we throw into the fire burns. It is the season of humiliation... A season that means the cry of chaos... The buds wither and die in the coldness of hearts And.... The flower of a cry does not grow on the lips. It is the season of humiliation... Whoever has a lock on his lips His hands are fruitful horns. The city.... has become a thirsty plain He wants water. The old mayor, but.... He wants the citizens to sleep 1347

Lantern

The city is dark. Its weary alleys, in a drowsy delirium, are burning... the city's eye burns with smoke. The constables have kindled a fire out of the brushwood of ignorance — a fire they have called the everlasting light... "the eternal fire is the waking sun"... The lie one is forced to believe is a dagger of pain. The soul burns at this "meaning" we are made to build out of suffering; everything we throw on the fire burns — all but the stony hearts of the hangmen. It is the season of humiliation... a season that spells the cry of riot... Buds shrivel in the cold of hearts, and no flower-of-protest blooms on the lips. It is the season of humiliation... and whoever keeps his lips locked, his hands are a laden bough. The city has become a parched plain, it begs for water — but the old constable wants its people asleep. 1347

1968 - ۱۳۴۷ · p. 45-46

city-smoke

متن اصلی

از کنار دشت... از جوارِ کوه... از زلالِ آبی قدیم پرشکوه... من به شهرِ دود آمدم... من به شهرِ پرصدای بی‌سرود... نه... به شهرِ بی امیدِ خستهٔ خمود آمدم... عمر می‌گذشت... آه می‌وزید... مارِ خستگی... دست چیدن مرا... چشمِ دیدنِ مرا... پای رفتنِ مرا به راهِ عشق می‌گزید... در چنین چَم کبود... در چنین غروبِ غم... در چنین خمارِ خستهٔ خمود... وای اگر خیالِ تو نبود... برقِ چشمهٔ زلالِ تو نبود... وای اگر صدای تو نبود... رازِ تو نبود... زخمه‌های سازِ تو نبود... بازوانِ باز تو نبود... در شبانِ پر هراسِ شهر... مردِ خسته‌ای در آرزوی ماه بود... زیرِ پای سایه‌های غم، کوچهٔ تو غرقِ آه بود... در غروبِ این ستاره‌ها... در صدایِ زخمدارِ این مناره‌ها... در صدای دور... در صدای حجم‌های آهنینِ بی‌سرود... عمرها تباه بود... شهر پرده‌ای سیاه بود... عشقِ روی تو چراغِ راه بود... شعله‌ای برای محوِ هر گناه بود... ۱۳۴۷

Machine

From the side of the plain From the side of the mountain... From the clear blue of the old, glorious... I came to the city of smoke... I came to the city full of noise without a song... No... I came to the city without hope, tired and hunched..... Life was passing by... It was sighing... The snake of fatigue... my hand-wringing... My eyes seeing... It was biting my feet on the path of love... In such a blue sky... in such a sunset of sadness... In such a drunkenness, tired and hunched... Wow, if it weren't for your imagination There wouldn't be the electricity of your clear spring. Wow, if it weren't for your voice... There wouldn't be your secret There wouldn't be your wounds There wouldn't be your open arms In the frightened shepherd of the city... A tired man was longing for the moon Under the shadows of sadness, your alley was drowning in sighs... In the sunset of these stars... In the wounded voice of these minarets... In the distant sound In the sound of songless iron volumes..... Life was ruined. The city was a black curtain Love on you was a beacon.... It was a flame to erase every sin... 1347

Lantern

From beside the plain, from the flank of the mountain, from the clear, old, glorious blue, I came to the city of smoke... I came to the city loud and songless... no — to the hopeless city, weary and slumped... Life slid by... a sigh kept blowing... the snake of exhaustion bit my plucking hand, bit my seeing eye, bit the foot I set on the road of love... In such a livid dusk... such a sorrowing sunset... such a weary, slumped half-stupor — oh, were it not for the thought of you, the gleam of your clear spring; oh, were it not for your voice... your secret, the struck strings of your music, your open arms — through the city's terror-filled nights a tired man went longing for the moon, and under the shadows of grief your alley drowned in sighs... In the setting of these stars, in the wounded cry of these minarets, in the far-off sound, in the sound of songless iron hulks — lifetimes lay ruined. The city was a black curtain; the love of your face was the lamp of the road, a flame to burn away every sin. 1347

January 1973 - تهران دی ماه ۱۳۵۱ · p. 47

fifty-moons

متن اصلی

در عبور شب گرد گیسوی تو میگردم مست از بوی تو می گردم لب به گوش تو میکنم نجوا این منم پنجاه داغ تر از تب سردتر از آه خنده ات با اشک من همراه... چند مهتاب دگر ؟ چند قرص ماه؟ تهران دی ماه ۱۳۵۱

Machine

In the night, I wander around your hair I wander drunk on your scent I whisper in your ear This is me, fifty Hotter than fever Colder than a sigh Your laughter is accompanied by my tears... How many more moons? How many moons? Tehran, January 1972

Lantern

In the passing of the night I circle round your hair, I wander drunk on your scent, I set my lips to your ear and whisper: here I am, fifty — hotter than fever, colder than a sigh, your laughter keeping company with my tears... How many more moonlit nights? How many full moons left? Tehran, Dey 1351

Autumn 1982 - پاییز ۱۳۶۱ · p. 49

shepherd-figs

متن اصلی

خاکستری خاکستری خاکستری مه باران صبح نگاه خاطره ابر در من ترانه ای نبود تو خواندی در من آینه ای نبود تو دیدی ریشه ای بودم در خواب خاکهای متبرک بی باران در نگاه تو سبز شدم برقی از چشمانت برخاست نگاهم بارانی شد گونه هایت خیس باران چشم هایت آفتابی گرگ ها میزایند بره ها را دریابیم... تو با چشمانت مرا بنواز چوبدست چوپانیم سلاحی کارگر خواهد شد بعد از جنگ با چوبدستم انجیرهای تازه را برای تو خواهم چید با تو خواهم ماند با تو خواهم خواند و تو را در بهت آفتابیت خواهم بوسید اگر ابرها بگذارند... پاییز ۱۳۶۱

Machine

gray gray gray morning rain fog cloud memory look There was no song in me, you sang it. There was no mirror in me, you saw. I was a root in the dream of the blessed soil. I became green in your eyes without rain. A spark came from your eyes. My eyes became cloudy Your cheeks are wet with rain Your eyes are sunny The wolves are coming Let's find the lambs... You play with me with your eyes. Our shepherd's staff will become a useful weapon. after the war I pluck fresh figs with my stick. I will pick for you I will stay with you I will read with you And you are in the sun's glare. i will kiss If the clouds leave... Autumn 1361

Lantern

Grey, grey, grey: the morning's rain-mist, the gaze, the cloud's remembering. There was no song in me — you sang it. There was no mirror in me — you saw. I was a root asleep in the blessed soil; with no rain, I greened in your gaze. A lightning lifted from your eyes and my own gaze turned to rain. Your cheeks wet with rain, your eyes full of sun. The wolves are whelping — let us gather in the lambs... Play me with your eyes. My shepherd's staff will turn into a working weapon. After the war, with that same staff I'll pick fresh figs for you, I'll stay with you, I'll sing with you, and I'll kiss you in your sunlit daze — if the clouds will let me... Autumn 1361

Summer 1987 - تابستان ۱۳۶۶ · p. 51

green-woodpecker

متن اصلی

به چتر درختی ایمن پناه برده ام و... مرا خواب در ربوده است از صدای دور دارکوبی بیدار میشوم خش خشی میشنوم تو از درختان انبوه به دریا می روی جنگل بستری ست از برگهای رنگین با صدای انفجاری... از جا میپرم... جنگل پر از همهمه میشود. هواپیماها میرند. تو هیچ نمی ترسی... به آغوش من پناه می آوری بوی برگها... بوی خاک... طعم دریا... و عطر نفس های تو... پرندگان جنگل خاموش اند.... آفتاب رفته است.... و من با پر سبز دارکوبی بر پشت چشمان بسته ات سایه میزنم تابستان ۱۳۶۶

Machine

I have taken refuge in the safe shade of a tree and... sleep has taken hold of me. I wake up to the distant sound of knocking. I hear rustling. You are from the thick trees You go to the sea The forest is a bed of colorful leaves. With an explosive sound... I jump up... The forest is filled with noise. Planes go. You are not afraid of anything... You take refuge in my arms The smell of leaves... the smell of soil... The taste of the sea... and the scent of your breath... The birds of the forest are silent. The sun has gone... And I, with a green feather, am a woodpecker. I cast a shadow behind your closed eyes. Summer 1366

Lantern

I've taken refuge under the safe canopy of a tree, and... sleep has carried me off. I wake to the far knocking of a woodpecker, I hear a rustling: you, through the crowded trees, are walking down to the sea. The forest is a bed of colored leaves. At the sound of an explosion... I spring up... the forest fills with clamor. The planes pass over. You are not afraid at all — you take shelter in my arms. The smell of leaves... the smell of earth... the taste of the sea... and the scent of your breathing... The birds of the forest have fallen silent... the sun has gone... and I, with a woodpecker's green feather, draw a soft shade across your closed eyes. Summer 1366

Summer 1987 - تابستان ۱۳۶۶ · p. 52

barren-cloud

متن اصلی

تو را دوست دارم بی باران و باران را دوست دارم با تو... های... با من باش تا ابر عقیم بر سرزمین گرفتار ببارد و چوبدست خشک دژخیم در خاک شب زده سبز شود... با من باش تا هر تیرک مرگ آور گیاه برگ آوری شود و بر اوج مناره ها که کلاغان لانه کرده اند پرستوها زمزمه کنند با من باش تا بجای گریز از بمبها در پناهگاه های بی پناه به چتر درختی ایمن از باران پناه بریم... های... تو را دوست دارم... تابستان ۱۳۶۶

Machine

i love you no rain And I like the rain with you Hey... stay with me Until the barren cloud falls on the troubled land And the dry, deadly stick To grow in the night-stricken soil... be with me to every deadly pole The plant should be leafed And on the top of the minarets that Crows have nested The swallows whisper. be with me Instead of running away from bombs In homeless shelters Under the umbrella of a tree, safe from the rain Let's take refuge... Hey... I love you... Summer 1366

Lantern

I love you without the rain, and I love the rain with you... Hey — stay with me, so the barren cloud may break over this captive land, and the hangman's dry staff go green in the night-stricken soil... Stay with me, so every death-dealing stake becomes a leafing plant, and high on the minarets where the crows have nested the swallows may murmur. Stay with me, so that instead of fleeing the bombs into shelters that shelter no one, we take refuge under the safe canopy of a tree, safe from the rain... Hey... I love you... Summer 1366

November 1987 - ۱۳۶۶/۸/۳۰ · p. 53

drink-sea

متن اصلی

در تاریکی ساحل در انتظارت نشسته ام... با زمزمه دریا چشمانم را میبندم و چون میگشایم دو ستاره گرم بر گونه هایم مینشیند تو در بازوان بسته ام روییده ای... چشمانت را میبندی و لبانت را میگشایی... های... دریا را ... دریا را ... دریا را مینوشم... ۱۳۶۶/۸/۳۰

Machine

I am waiting for you in the darkness of the beach... I close my eyes to the whisper of the sea. And when we open Two warm stars sit on my cheeks. You grew up in my closed arms... You close your eyes And you open your lips... Hai... the sea... the sea... I drink the sea... 1366/8/30

Lantern

In the dark of the shore I sit and wait for you... to the murmur of the sea I close my eyes, and when I open them two warm stars come to rest on my cheeks. You have grown up inside my folded arms... you close your eyes and open your lips... Hey... the sea... the sea... I drink the sea... 1366/8/30

Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶ · p. 54-55

horse-hooves

متن اصلی

این صدای سم اسبان است با رپ رپه طبل ها ... تو را در برکه های هذیانی تبهایم بر اسب میبینم اسب می ماند. سم می کوبد... سر می ساید تو خاموشی... و من لبهایم را به بلندترین فریاد گشوده ام. نسیم از دریا به جنگل در گذار است تو میشنوی که میگویم دوستت دارم... نگاهت آفتابی میشود. سایه اسب بر ساحل مینشیند اسب میرمد رعد در بال باد در پاها... هنوز لبانم به بلندترین فریاد گشوده است فریاد در جنگل میپیچد بمان... جنگ تمام خواهد شد.... پرندگان مانده اند... بمان... دوستت دارم... تو... می روی... و... من لحظه دیشب در سر لحظه امشب در دل به پناهگاه بر می گردم... زمستان ۱۳۶۶

Machine

This is the sound of horses' hoofs With the rap of the drums... I will bathe you in delirious pools. I see on a horse The horse stays. The hoof knocks... head rubs You are silent... And I my lips I have opened the loudest cry. The breeze is passing from the sea to the forest. You hear me say. I love you... Your gaze becomes sunny. The shadow of a horse sits on the shore. The horse dies Thunder in the wings Wind in the legs... My lips are still open to the loudest scream. A scream echoes through the forest stay... The war will end. The birds have stayed... Stay... I love you... you... go... And... I was thinking about it last night. Tonight's moment in the heart I'm going back to the shelter... Winter 1366

Lantern

This is the sound of horses' hooves, with the rat-a-tat of drums... In the delirious pools of my fever I see you on horseback. The horse halts. A hoof pounds... it rubs its head. You are silent... and I have opened my lips in the loudest cry. The breeze is crossing from the sea to the forest. You hear me saying I love you... and your gaze turns sunny. The horse's shadow settles on the shore. The horse bolts — thunder in its wings, wind in its legs... Still my lips are parted in the loudest cry, the cry goes winding through the forest: Stay... the war will end... the birds have stayed... stay... I love you... You... are leaving... and I — last night's moment in my head, tonight's in my heart — turn back to the shelter... Winter 1366

Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶ · p. 56

sunless-gaze

متن اصلی

دلم گرفته نگاه تو آفتابی نیست به بیکران کبودت زلال آبی نیست ز سردی نگهت قامت دلم افسرد قیامتی است در آن دل که صبر و تابی نیست به آب دیده بشویم غبار چشمانت در این زمانه که در برگِ گل گلابی نیست نگاه میرمد از چشم من به گیسویت اسیر تشنه به ظلمات و برق آبی نیست دلیر باش و شبی جرئت گناهی کن در این دو روزه اگر فرصت ثوابی نیست بنوش ورنه چو نوبت به غم رسد بینی درون ساغر شوقت نم شرابی نیست بیا به گرمی محجوب عشق دلبندیم به دشت شب زده امید آفتابی نیست زمستان ۱۳۶۶

Machine

I'm saddened by your lack of sunshine. Your infinite blueness is not as clear as blue. My heart is depressed by the coldness of your posture. There is a resurrection in that heart where there is no patience or endurance. Let's be seen in the water, the dust in your eyes At this time, when there is no pear in the leaf of the flower My eyes wander to your hair, a captive thirsty for darkness and no blue lightning. Be brave and dare to sin one night. If there is no opportunity for reward in these two days, Drink, otherwise when the time comes for sadness, your nose in the cup of longing is not a drop of wine. Come, let us fall in love with the unobstructed warmth of love. There is no sunny hope in the night-stricken plain. Winter 1366

Lantern

My heart is heavy: there is no sun in your gaze, in your boundless blue, no clear blue water runs. The cold of your look has withered my heart's whole stature — a judgment-day in that heart, with no patience, no endurance left. Let me wash the dust from your eyes with the water of mine, in this age when there's no rosewater left in the petal. My gaze bolts from my eye toward your hair, a thirsting captive in the dark — and there is no blue lightning. Be brave: for one night dare a single sin, if in these two short days there's no chance at merit. Drink — or when your turn at grief comes round, you'll find not a drop of wine in the cup of your own longing. Come, let us be tender lovers in the bashful warmth of love — on this night-stricken plain there is no hope of sun. Winter 1366

Winter 1987 - زمستان ۱۳۶۶ · p. 57

green-pond

متن اصلی

های... دوست دارمت دوست دارمت... با عبور این صدا از کویر حنجرم در نگاه تو برکه کبود سبز میشود... زمستان ۱۳۶۶

Machine

Hey... I love you I love you... By passing this sound from Hanjarm desert in your eyes Blue Pond It turns green... Winter 1366

Lantern

Hey... I love you, I love you... and as this sound crosses the desert of my throat, in your gaze the dark-blue pond turns green... Winter 1366

1988 - ۱۳۶۷ · p. 58

gray-kisses

متن اصلی

آه از چشم های نیمه باز تو بعد از بلندترین بوسه های خاکستری باران.... ۱۳۶۷

Machine

Oh, your half-open eyes. After the tallest gray rain kisses 1367

Lantern

Ah — those half-open eyes of yours, after the longest grey kisses of the rain... 1367

1988 - ۱۳۶۷ · p. 59

one-thing

متن اصلی

تنها یک چیز را از تو بیشتر دوست دارم این که... تو را دوست دارم... ۱۳۶۷

Machine

Only one thing from you I like more That... I love you... 1367

Lantern

There is only one thing I love more than you: that... I love you... 1367

1988 - ۱۳۶۷ · p. 60

shelter-wall

متن اصلی

من در پناهگاهم تو دور از من به تو می اندیشم شعری در من نطفه میبندد شعرم را به دیوار پناهگاه مینویسم و در فاصله دو انفجار به دیدار تو میشتابم در گذار از جنگل به دریا هوا مه آلود است و طعم گونه هایت همچون همهمه دریاست در نفسی بلند در شانه هایت میخوانم تو را دوست دارم بی باران و باران را دوست دارم با تو و تو را دوست دارم و باران را دوست دارم و فاصله دو بمب را دوست دارم های... بیا با یاد سهراب همه مرغابی های وحشت زده را بشمریم... ۱۳۶۷

Machine

I am in the shelter you are far from me I think of you A poem is sprouting in me. I write my poetry on the wall of the shelter. And within two explosions I am rushing to meet you. In the transition from the forest to the sea The weather is foggy And the taste of your cheeks It is like the roar of the sea in a long breath. I sing on your shoulders. I love you without rain And I love the rain with you. and i love you And I like the rain And I like the distance between the two bombs. Hey... come with Sohrab's memory Let's count all the scared ducks... 1367

Lantern

I am in the shelter, you, far from me. I think of you, and a poem takes seed in me. I write my poem on the shelter wall, and in the gap between two blasts I rush to meet you. On the passage from forest to sea the air hangs misty, and the taste of your cheeks is like the sea's murmur drawn out in one long breath. On your shoulders I sing: I love you without the rain, and I love the rain with you, and I love you, and I love the rain, and I love the gap between two bombs. Hey — come, in memory of Sohrab, let us count all the terrified ducks... 1367

1989 - زمستان ۱۳۶۷ · p. 63

snow-without-you

متن اصلی

تو به سفری کوتاه می‌روی من از کوچه بی تو... من از خانه بی تو... می‌گذرم... من بی تو می‌گذرم... برف می‌بارد... برف بی تو می‌بارد... برف بر گونه‌هایم در اشک می‌بارد... من در برف بی تو می‌گذرم... کوچه خاموش است... خانه خاموش است... من بی حرف در برف می‌گذرم... زمستان ۱۳۶۷

Machine

You go on a short journey I pass through the alley without you... I pass through the house without you... I pass without you... It is snowing... It snows without you... Snow falls on my cheeks in tears... I pass in the snow without you... The alley is silent... The house is silent... I pass wordlessly in the snow... Winter 1367

Lantern

You go away on a short journey. I pass through the alley without you... through the house without you... I pass, without you... Snow is falling... the snow falls without you... snow falls on my cheeks and dissolves into tears... I pass through the snow without you... The alley has gone quiet... the house has gone quiet... and wordless, I pass through the snow... — Winter 1367

Translator's Notes

The poem runs on a single repeated verb, می‌گذرم ("I pass / I pass through"), and the refrain بی تو ("without you"). "برف بر گونه‌هایم در اشک می‌بارد" is literally "snow falls on my cheeks into tears" — the snow melting on a warm face becomes weeping; I rendered it "snow falls on my cheeks and dissolves into tears." خاموش is both "silent" and "extinguished," so the hushed alley and house are also, faintly, snuffed out.

1989 - زمستان ۱۳۶۷ · p. 64

dotar-player

متن اصلی

خواب می‌بینی تو دوتاری هستی من نوازنده بی‌صبر و قراری هستم. دشت ارژن خاموش آتشی بر جانم می‌زنم می‌خوانم می‌پری از خواب مانده بر پیکر تو نقش انگشتانم. زمستان ۱۳۶۷

Machine

You are dreaming You are a dotar (a two-stringed instrument) I am a restless and impatient player. Dasht-e Arjan is silent A fire upon my soul I play, I sing You wake from your sleep Left upon your body The imprint of my fingers. Winter 1367

Lantern

You are dreaming. You are a dotar, and I, your player — restless, without rest. The Arjan plain lies silent, a fire laid upon my soul. I strike the strings, I sing. You startle awake: left upon your body, the print of my fingers. — Winter 1367

Translator's Notes

The whole poem is one musical conceit: the beloved is a دوتار (dotar, a two-stringed long-necked lute), the poet the نوازنده (player) who can find no rest. می‌زنم is "I play / I strike [the strings]" — and to play this instrument is to touch her body, so the fingers that worked the strings leave their mark when she wakes. دشت ارژن (Dasht-e Arjan) is a plain and seasonal wetland west of Shiraz, in Fars — its stillness sets the hush the music breaks.

1989 - اسفند ۱۳۶۷ · p. 65

jungle-to-sea

متن اصلی

جنگ تمام شد... و... تو ادامه داری... و جنگل هنوز پای‌بند دریاست... و من تو را دوست دارم... که هر روز خواهش محجوب جنگل را برهنه، به دریا می‌گویی... اسفند ۱۳۶۷

Machine

The war ended... And... you continue... And the jungle is still bound to the sea... And I love you... because Every day You nakedly tell The modest desire of the jungle To the sea... Esfand 1367

Lantern

The war has ended... and... you go on... and still the forest is bound to the sea... and I love you... because, every day, the bashful longing of the forest you tell — naked — to the sea... — Esfand 1367

Translator's Notes

Companion to the page-61 poem: the sea/forest pair returns, now as a figure for the lovers. پای‌بند is "bound, pledged, faithful to." خواهش محجوب is the "bashful / modest desire" of the forest, which the beloved speaks برهنه (nakedly, openly) to the sea — she is the one who says aloud, without shame, the longing the forest cannot. Esfand is the last month of the Persian year (Feb–Mar 1989); the Iran–Iraq ceasefire had taken hold the previous summer, so "the war has ended" is literal as well as figurative.

1989 - ۱۳۶۸ · p. 67

drop-of-red

متن اصلی

وقتی دلتنگم به تو می‌اندیشم یاد تو مربعی‌ست محو و لرزان در زمینه خاکستری روشن در این مربع‌ها من با بهم زدن پلک‌هایم گذشته را نقاشی می‌کنم. بین من و تو غبار و دیوار است به سحر این مربع‌ها من از دیوارها می‌گذرم در رسیدن به تو تنها راه گذشتن است باید چراغ رنگ بدست بگیرم و در خاکستری‌هایم به دنبال تو بگردم ای کاش می‌توانستم یک قطره بیشتر با سرخ نقاشی کنم... تهران ۱۳۶۸

Machine

When I am homesick, I think of you The memory of you is a faded, trembling square On a light gray background In these squares I By blinking my eyelids Paint the past. Between you and me There is dust and a wall By the magic of these squares I pass through the walls In reaching you The only way is to pass I must take up the lantern of color And search for you in my grays I wish I could Paint one drop more With red... Tehran 1368

Lantern

When the longing takes me, I think of you. The memory of you is a square, blurred and trembling against a ground of pale grey. Inside these squares I — with the shutting of my eyelids — paint the past. Between you and me there is dust, and a wall. By the magic of these squares I pass through the walls; to reach you, the only road is through. I must take up the lamp of colour and go looking for you in my greys. If only I could lay down one more drop of red... — Tehran, 1368

Translator's Notes

A painter's poem — Jafari was a painter as well as a poet, and it shows: memory as a blurred square on a grey ground, the eyelids' blink as a brushstroke, grief held in a palette drained to grey, with red the one withheld colour of life and love. چراغ رنگ is literally "the lamp/lantern of colour"; the machine pass already reached for "lantern," which sits oddly close to this collection's own name for the working-draft layer, so the finished line keeps "lamp." سحر here is سِحر (magic, enchantment), not سحَر (dawn).

Shell Shock

1989 - ۱۳۶۸ · p. 68

war-delirium

متن اصلی

هذیان بعد از جنگ... اگر ابرها خاکستری نبودند باران رنگ دیگری داشت و اشک‌های تو سبز کم رنگ بودند. رنگ جنگ در آه می‌ماند در نگاه می‌ماند من نفرت از جنگ را در چشم‌ها دیده‌ام و نفرت از صلح را در دندان‌ها اگر ابرها خاکستری نبودند باران رنگ دیگری داشت می‌دانم چشم‌هایت در مهتاب زیباترند اما... باید به پناهگاه برگردیم تهران ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Delirium after war... If the clouds were not gray The rain would have another color And your tears Would be pale green. The color of war remains in a sigh, remains in a gaze I have seen the hatred of war in eyes And the hatred of peace in teeth If the clouds were not gray The rain would have another color I know your eyes are more beautiful in the moonlight But... We must return to the shelter Tehran 1368

Lantern

Shell shock, after the war... If the clouds were not grey, the rain would be another colour, and your tears would be pale green. The colour of war stays in the sigh, stays in the eye. I have seen the hatred of war in eyes, and the hatred of peace in teeth. If the clouds were not grey, the rain would be another colour. I know your eyes are more beautiful in the moonlight, but... we must go back to the shelter. Tehran, 1368

Ben

Shell shocked, after war... If the clouds were not grey, the rain would take on other colors and your tears would green thinly. The color of war stays in the sigh, it stays in the gaze. I have seen in eyes the hatred of war, and the hatred of peace in teeth. If the clouds were not grey, the rain would take on other colors I know your eyes are more gorgeous in the moonlight, but... we must go back to the shelter.

Translator's Notes

هذیان is the raving of fever or shell-shock, and بعد از جنگ dates it: ۱۳۶۸ is 1989, a year after the August 1988 ceasefire. **So there is no raid.** The poem announces itself as a symptom and then performs one — the counterfactual comes back word for word, the way a delirious man repeats himself, and the closing line is a reflex firing after the danger has stopped. What breaks off the tenderness is not a siren but the war still running inside him. پناهگاه is the same bomb-shelter as the page-60 poem, which was written while the shelter was still needed. **Why the rain would be a different colour.** The counterfactual is a painter's, and it is doing more than it appears to. Rain has no colour of its own; it takes the sky's — which is why rain against an overcast looks grey and rain at sunset looks gold. Tears are rain on a face, so they borrow too. The chain runs: the clouds are grey, so the rain is grey, so her weeping is grey — and if the sky were anything else, the same tears would come out سبز کم‌رنگ, a pale green, which in this book is the colour of longing (page 88, "the green of longing"). He is saying that grief takes its colour from the weather and the weather is war: under this sky there is not even longing left in her crying. And he cannot change the sky. He is a painter, so the only way he has of saying *the war has ruined us* is to say *the grey has ruined the rain* — which the next line then states outright: رنگ جنگ در آه می‌ماند, the colour of war stays. **سبز کم‌رنگ, and the dial it sits on.** کم‌رنگ is کم ("low") + رنگ ("colour") — Persian's ordinary way of turning a colour down, the mirror of پررنگ, "full-coloured." Two things follow. The کم‌ prefix is the language's deficiency prefix — the same shape as کم‌نور (dim), کم‌عمق (shallow), کم‌خون (anaemic) — so where English *pale green* names a tint on a chart, the Persian says *green, and not enough of it*. And پررنگ‌تر, the other end of that same dial, is the verb of the book's title sentence: بوی کاهگل آواز پرنده را پررنگ‌تر می‌کند, the smell of adobe deepens the colour of the bird's song (page 72, and again in the letter to Alizadeh). Four pages apart, one poem turns the saturation up and this one finds it turned down. Which is the measure of the whole counterfactual. Green in this book is longing — سبزِ آرزو, "the green of longing," on page 88; "I will turn green with the memory of you" on page 95 — so a pale green is longing with the colour low in it. And note how little the wish asks for: even in the world where the clouds are not grey, her tears are only *faintly* green. The delirium cannot imagine them bright. It manages one small correction to the sky and stops. The Persian turns to sound at exactly the point where it states that finding. رنگ جنگ (*rang-e jang*, "the colour of war") rhymes inside itself, and the line then closes on آه … نگاه (*âh … negâh*) — four rhyming syllables in one line. English can have one of the two: *stays in the sigh, stays in the eye*, taking نگاه as the eye rather than the gaze, which the next line's چشم‌ها is about to do regardless. **Why teeth.** Persian puts almost nothing about speech in the teeth: talk lives in the tongue (زبان) and the mouth (دهان), and gossip is a thing done behind a back, not between molars. What lives in the teeth is force. دندان قروچه کردن is to grind them in rage; دندان نشان دادن, to bare them, is to threaten; دندان تیز کردن, to sharpen them, is to be hungry for a thing one intends to take; and دندان روی جگر گذاشتن — to set one's tooth on one's liver — is to bite down and endure what cannot be said aloud. So the line is not about smiling, and not about talk. It is about appetite and clench: what people are ready to do, and what they are holding in. Eyes are where a thing is received and can be read off a face; teeth are where it is done. Taken as one face, the eyes have had enough of the war and the mouth has not — which is colder than either half by itself, and it is why the poem insists he has *seen* both. (The ceasefire of 1988 was not universally welcome in Iran, which is the ground this line stands on; the poem names no one.) English gets an accidental gift here: *in the teeth of* already means *in defiance of*, so "the hatred of peace in teeth" carries a second sense the Persian did not plant but does not mind. چشم‌ها and دندان‌ها are bare plurals — "in eyes," "in teeth," with no possessive. Not *their* eyes, not *our* teeth: an anatomy, and a diagnosis. Eyes are where a thing is received and teeth are where it is bared, so the body is split, one half sick of the war and the other half unable to stop. That someone should hate *the peace*, a year after it arrived, is the coldest line in the book. **And the grey has ash in it.** خاکستری is خاکستر — ash — with an adjective ending: Persian's ordinary word for the colour is *ash-coloured*, the way English "orange" is a fruit nobody tastes any more. Two things make that worth saying here. The poem's subject is what war leaves behind, and ash is precisely residue. And خاکستر is built on خاک, clay — the word this book renders "clay," and the word standing in its own title, بوی کاهگل, the smell of straw-and-clay. Adobe is what the walls are made of; ash is what adobe becomes when the house burns. The smell the book is named for and the colour the war leaves behind are the same material, before and after fire. *Ash-grey* for خاکستری was weighed and not taken. It is defensible on the ground just given, but the poem wants to make its own reveal: for five lines this may be weather, and then line six tells you it is war. Ash in the second line arrives with the answer already inside it. Grey is also flat, and flatness is how delirium sounds — every other word in this poem is ordinary (clouds, rain, tears, eyes, teeth, moonlight, shelter), so a compound would be the one literary thing on the page. The etymology is here instead, for whoever wants it. خاکستری is also the poet's own colour, loved outright on page 76 ("I love the greys, the greys…") and turned against him here.

1989 - بهار ۱۳۶۸ · p. 69

desert-moonlight

متن اصلی

ای... آن پر طراوتِ بارانی مهتابِ بی‌دریغِ بیابانی چون از سفر به چشمِ تو برگردم با شعله‌های آتشِ پنهانی هر برگ در نگاهِ تَرَم باغی‌ست هر غنچه شهرِ شادِ چراغانی. بهار ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Oh... that rainy freshness The unsparing moonlight of the desert When I return from my journey to your eyes With the flames of a hidden fire Every leaf in my wet gaze is a garden Every bud a joyous, illuminated city. Spring 1368

Lantern

O you — that rain-freshened, dewy grace, the desert's unstinting moonlit face: when I come home from the journey to your eyes bearing the flames of a hidden fire, every leaf in my brimming gaze is a garden, every bud a glad city ablaze with light. — Spring 1368

Translator's Notes

The only formally classical piece in this group: a rhymed, metrical fragment in the manner of a ghazal, the line-ends chiming بارانی / بیابانی / پنهانی / چراغانی (-âni). The lantern reaches for a little of that music (grace / face) without forcing the full mono-rhyme. چراغانی is the festival lighting-up of a city — lamps strung for celebration — so the closing bud opens like a town lit for a feast. نگاهِ تَر, "the wet/moist gaze," is a gaze brimming to tears with feeling, not with grief.

July 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۵/۱ · p. 71

rainy-alleys

متن اصلی

سَرم به شانهٔ تو با نوای هجرانی بلندی نَفَسم پُر ز عطرِ حیرانی دو چشم بسته‌ام و در هوای گرییدن عبور می‌کنم از کوچه‌های بارانی ۱۳۶۸/۵/۱

Machine

My head on your shoulder, with the strain of parting The rise of my breath full of the scent of bewilderment Both eyes closed, and in the mood for weeping I pass through the rainy alleys 1368/5/1

Lantern

My head on your shoulder, a parting-air playing, my breath drawn long and full of the scent of bewilderment. Both eyes shut, and in a mood to weep, I pass on through the rainy alleys. 1368/5/1

Autumn 1989 - تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸ · p. 72

adobe-birdsong

متن اصلی

امشب صدای کبوترانم را نقاشی کردم. در دیوارهای توبه تو سایه تو را شنیدم من آواز خواندم من با دوتار پیری آواز خواندم و خط‌های آبی‌رنگ صدای زنی که دوستش دارم آواز خسته مرا رنگین کرد من و تو آواز خواندیم تا نفسِ مهتاب خاکستری شد... در نقاشی‌هایم صدای تو را دیدم تمام شب... مهتاب در مربع خنده‌های تو کودکیم را نقاشی می‌کرد کاش باران ببارد... کاش باران ببارد... بوی کاهگل آواز پرنده را پررنگ‌تر می‌کند. تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Tonight I painted the voice of my doves. On the walls of your repentance I heard your shadow I sang I sang with an old dotar and the blue lines of the voice of a woman whom I love made my tired song colorful you and I sang until the breath of the moonlight turned gray... In my paintings I saw your voice All night... the moonlight in the square of your laughter was painting my childhood I wish it would rain... I wish it would rain... The smell of straw-and-clay makes the bird's song deeper in color. Tehran, autumn 1368

Lantern

Tonight I painted the voices of my doves. On the walls of your ⟨repentance⟩ I heard your shadow. I sang. I sang with an aged dotar, and the blue lines of a woman's voice — a woman I love — gave my tired song its colour. You and I sang until the breath of the moonlight went gray... In my paintings I saw your voice. All night... the moonlight, in the square of your laughter, was painting my childhood. If only it would rain... If only it would rain... The smell of adobe deepens the colour of the bird's song. Tehran, autumn 1368

Translator's Notes

کاهگل (kâhgel) is the straw-and-clay daub of Iranian walls and roofs; what rain draws out of it is the smell of home. The book takes its title — بوی کاهگل و آواز پرنده, The Smell of Adobe and Birdsong — from the last three lines here, and it is worth seeing that the Persian is not a pairing but a claim: the smell of the adobe deepens the colour of the bird's song. The same sentence comes back in the dream-letter to Hossein Alizadeh, where it is Alizadeh who says it. The whole poem crosses the senses in one direction — a painter's. He paints voices, hears a shadow, sees a voice in his own paintings, and takes a woman's voice as blue lines. The moonlight, not the poet, is what paints his childhood.

Autumn 1989 - تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸ · p. 73

rain-forgotten

متن اصلی

های... باران... تو می‌باری... تا بوی کاهگل را که فراموش کرده‌ای به خاطر آوری. باران ببار... زنی را که دوست دارم سفر می‌کند و چون برگردد مرا از خاطر برده است... تهران، پاییز ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Hey... rain... You are raining... so that you may bring to mind the smell of straw-and-clay that you have forgotten. Rain, rain down... The woman I love goes travelling and when she comes back she has put me out of mind... Tehran, autumn 1368

Lantern

Hey... rain... you are raining... so that the smell of adobe you have let go of comes back to mind. Rain, rain down... The woman I love is off travelling, and when she comes back she has put me out of mind... Tehran, autumn 1368

1990s - دههٔ ۷۰ · p. 74

no-canvas

متن اصلی

نقاشی‌هایم را می‌سرایم... نه بوم می‌خواهد، نَه... دیوار... نَه قصهٔ خریدار نَه غصه، کُنجِ انبار... دههٔ ۷۰

Machine

I compose my paintings... It wants no canvas, no... wall... no tale of a buyer no grief in the corner of a storeroom... The 1370s

Lantern

I sing my paintings... It wants no canvas, no... wall... no tale of a buyer, no tally of grief in a store-room corner... The 1370s

Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸ · p. 75

for-whom

متن اصلی

وقتی تو می‌خوانی کسی نمی‌پرسد برای چه می‌خوانی برای که می‌خوانی. وقتی پرنده‌ای می‌خواند همه می‌دانند برای چه می‌خواند برای که می‌خواند. وقتی من نقاشی می‌کنم تو می‌پرسی برای چه؟... برای که؟... پاییز ۱۳۶۸

Machine

When you sing no one asks why you are singing for whom you are singing. When a bird sings everyone knows why it is singing for whom it is singing. When I paint you ask Why?... For whom?... Autumn 1368

Lantern

When you sing nobody asks what you are singing for, who you are singing for. When a bird sings everybody knows what it is singing for, who it is singing for. When I paint you ask What for?... For whom?... Autumn 1368

Translator's Notes

Dedicated to Mohammad-Reza Shajarian (1940–2020), the great voice of Persian classical song — which is the ground the joke stands on: nobody asks Shajarian to explain why he sings. برای چه ('what for') and برای که ('for whom') differ by a single letter, so in Persian the poem's last two lines are almost the same sound asked twice.

Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸ · p. 76

love-grays

متن اصلی

در نقاشی‌هایم آن‌جا که تاریکی‌ست به دنبال تو می‌گردم و آن‌جا که روشنی‌ست تو را از دست داده‌ام. خاکستری‌ها را دوست دارم خاکستری‌ها را... پاییز ۱۳۶۸

Machine

In my paintings there where it is dark I go searching for you and there where it is light I have lost you. I love the grays the grays... Autumn 1368

Lantern

In my paintings, there where the dark is I go looking for you, and there where the light is I have lost you. I love the grays, the grays... Autumn 1368

Autumn 1989 - پاییز ۱۳۶۸ · p. 77

paint-my-voice

متن اصلی

گفتم تو را دوست دارم صدای مرا نقاشی کن دلتنگ توام اندوه مرا نقاشی کن به تو می‌اندیشم در غمِ دیگران پندارِ مرا نقاشی کن. گفتی در خلائی که هوا نیست نه من تو را می‌خوانم نه تو مرا می‌شنوی برایم چراغی بیاور بی‌نور چگونه نقاشی کنم. پاییز ۱۳۶۸

Machine

I said I love you paint my voice I am lonely for you paint my sorrow I think of you in the grief of others paint my imagining. You said in a void where there is no air neither do I call you nor do you hear me bring me a lamp without light, how am I to paint. Autumn 1368

Lantern

I said: I love you, paint my voice. I am heartsick for you, paint my sorrow. I think of you inside other people's grief, paint what I imagine. You said: in a void where there is no air I do not call you and you do not hear me. Bring me a lamp — how am I to paint without light? Autumn 1368

November 1989 - آبان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 78

old-blue

متن اصلی

من به رنگ ابر و به بوی خاک و به طعمِ اشک و به عمق آسمان صمیمی‌ام تشنه... تشنهٔ قطره... قطره... آبی قدیمی‌ام... آبان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

I am intimate as the color of cloud and the smell of earth and the taste of tears and the depth of the sky thirsty... thirsting for a drop... a drop... I am an old blue... Aban 1368

Lantern

I am on intimate terms with the colour of cloud and the smell of earth and the taste of tears and the depth of the sky — thirsty... thirsting for a drop... one drop... of my own old blue... Aban 1368

Translator's Notes

The colour of cloud, the smell of earth, the taste of tears: Jafari had used this exact triad some twenty-three years earlier, in the poem that stands here as oldest-song and that Farrokhi quotes in his introduction, where the three are similes for a love that goes on always. Here they are not comparisons but company — things he says he is intimate with. The last line can be read two ways, and Persian does not choose: آبی قدیمی‌ام is either "I am an old blue," which chimes with صمیمی‌ام ("I am intimate") three lines above, or "my old blue," the thing he is thirsting for a drop of.

نامه‌ای با امضاء به حسین علیزاده

A Letter, Signed, to Hossein Alizadeh

December 1989 - تهران آذر ۱۳۶۸ · p. 79-82

letter-alizadeh

متن اصلی

آن‌شب باران می‌بارید... خواب دیدم تو... در کارِ نواختنِ نقش‌های رنگینِ یک گلیمِ اصیلی... و من... صدایِ سازِ عاشق‌های خراسان را، نقاشی می‌کنم... گفتم تو را دوست دارم، کاش، نقاشی‌های مرا می‌دیدی... گفتی گوش کن... و همهٔ نقاشی‌های مرا، ندیده نواختی... گویی در خواب هذیان می‌گویم... گفتم... ابر به هوای بوی کاهگل می‌بارد، و بوی کاهگل نَفَسِ پرنده است... نَفَسِ پرنده... با سازِ تو... پررنگ‌تر می‌شود.... گفتی: بوی کاهگل آوازِ پرنده را... رنگین‌تر می‌کند... «همیشه آواز برای شنیدن نیست، گاه خواندن هم چون نمک بر زخم، برای بیدار ماندن است.» گفتم: در این شبِ بارانی، تا آمدنِ تو، در پنجره، چراغ بیاویزم... گفتی: چراغ نَه، آوازَت را، مثلِ چِراغ، در جانِ پنجره بیاویز، بی‌ترس از باد... و... نگاهِ بد. آواز تو خاموش نخواهد شد... آواز تو، شکسته‌تر از آنست، که باز هم بشکنند... آواز باید، نفسی تازه باشد... در هوایی معاصر. هیچ پرنده‌ای... آوازِ دیروز را تکرار نمی‌کند. تهمتِ تکرار... درعادتِ ماست... عشق، نگاهِ نو را با خود دارد... تو، در پیِ عناصرِ اصیلِ تازه باش... من تشنهٔ نگاه معاصر درهوای قدیمی‌ام... گفتم: من صداهای معاصر، در فضاهای قدیمی را نقاشی کرده‌ام... اما، آبی هوای قدیمی را... به سربی هوای تازه نمی‌بخشم... ای کاش آن «پیرِ شاعر» هم... نقاشی‌های مرا نگاه نمی‌کرد... می‌دید و می‌شنید... من، بارها... در بامدادِ سرد.... و... شامگاه درد.... «از پشتِ شیشه‌ها به خیابان نظر کرده‌ام» و... واژه‌های سرخِ شعرش را، بر سنگ‌فرشِ سیاهِ دیده‌ام، که سراسیمه، می‌دوند... تو هیچ نگفتی... سکوتِ بی‌تابی، از چشمانت برمی‌خواست... دستی، یک جرعهٔ شراب در جامی ریخت... جام نو بود، شراب کهنه... گفتی بنوش، مستی، زمان نمی‌شناسد... تو را دوست دارم، صدای مرا نقاشی کن... و سرگرم نواختن شدی. پنجه‌هایت، مثلِ باران... همهٔ دیوارهای قدیمی را پاک می‌کرد... پنجره‌ها باز می‌شدند، و با هر زخمه... پرنده‌ای... از دریچهٔ قفسی رها می‌گشت... با آهنگ‌های تو، چلچله‌ها سپید می‌شدند، و... پرستوها، رنگین... و کودکان فریاد می‌زدند: «ما از سیاهی بیزاریم... ما کلاغ‌هایی به رنگِ آبی دوست داریم» و من... در مربع خنده‌های زنی که دوست دارم، آهنگ‌هایی نقاشی می‌کردم، که عثمان، دوتارزنِ جادویی خواف را... حیران می‌کرد... گفتم: من صدای تو را، و... دیگران را... که تو را دوست دارند، نقاشی می‌کنم... صداهای معاصر در فضاهای قدیمی، یا... فضاهای معاصر در صداهای قدیمی... مثلِ آهنگ‌های تو. درخواب، نامِ آخرین ساخته‌هایت را پرسیدم گفتی: اولین لالایی برای کودکی عثمانِ خوافی... و... فراغی شاد... و... زمزمهٔ چوپانی گنجشک‌های جنگل نور... و... دلتنگی برای... آهوان و پرندگان یک فرشِ قدیمی... و... مرثیه‌ای بزرگ برای... پنجه‌های کوچکِ دخترانِ قالی‌باف... از خواب بیدار شدم، آفتاب سرزده بود، اما... باران هنوز می‌بارید... تهران آذر ۱۳۶۸

Machine

That night it was raining... I dreamed you... at the work of playing the colored patterns of a true kilim... and I... am painting the sound of the saz of the ashiqs of Khorasan... I said I love you, I wish you could have seen my paintings... You said listen... and, unseen, you played every one of my paintings... As though I were raving in a dream... I said... The cloud rains out of longing for the smell of straw-and-clay, and the smell of straw-and-clay is the breath of the bird... The breath of the bird... with your saz... grows deeper in color.... You said: The smell of straw-and-clay makes the bird's song... more colorful... "Song is not always for hearing, sometimes singing, like salt on a wound, is for staying awake." I said: on this rainy night, until you come, let me hang a lamp in the window... You said: not a lamp, hang your song, like a lamp, in the soul of the window, unafraid of the wind... and... the evil eye. Your song will not be put out... Your song is more broken than what they could break again... A song must be a fresh breath... in contemporary air. No bird... repeats yesterday's song. The charge of repetition... lies in our habit... Love carries the new gaze with it... Be after fresh, authentic elements... I thirst for a contemporary gaze in my old air... I said: I have painted contemporary sounds in old spaces... but the blue of the old air... I will not give over to the lead-gray of the new... I only wish that "old poet" too... had not looked at my paintings... had seen, and heard... I have, many times... in the cold dawn.... and... the evening of pain.... "from behind the window-panes I have gazed out at the street" and... the red words of his poem I have seen on the black paving stones, running headlong... You said nothing... a restless silence was rising out of your eyes... A hand poured a mouthful of wine into a cup... The cup was new, the wine old... You said drink; drunkenness knows nothing of time... I love you, paint my voice... and you fell to playing. Your fingers, like rain... were washing every old wall clean... The windows were opening, and with each stroke of the plectrum... a bird... was set loose from the hatch of a cage... With your melodies the swallows turned white, and... the martins, many-colored... and the children were shouting: "We loathe the blackness... we love crows the color of blue" and I... in the square of the laughter of a woman I love, I was painting melodies that left Osman, the magician dotar-player of Khaf... bewildered... I said: I paint your voice, and... the others... who love you... contemporary sounds in old spaces, or... contemporary spaces in old sounds... like your melodies. In the dream I asked the names of your latest compositions. You said: "First lullaby for the childhood of Osman of Khaf"... and... "A joyful Faraghi"... and... "A shepherd's murmur of the sparrows of the forest of light"... and... "A longing for the deer and the birds of an old carpet"... and... "A great elegy for the small fingers of the carpet-weaving girls"... I woke from the dream; the sun had come up, but... the rain was still falling... Tehran, Azar 1368

Lantern

That night it was raining... I dreamed you... at the work of playing the coloured patterns of a true kilim... and I... painting the sound of the saz of the ashiqs of Khorasan... I said: I love you. I wish you had seen my paintings... You said: listen... and, without looking, you played every painting I had... As if I were talking in my sleep... I said... The cloud rains out of longing for the smell of adobe, and the smell of adobe is the breath of the bird... The breath of the bird... under your hand... deepens in colour... You said: The smell of adobe makes the bird's song... richer in colour... "A song is not always for hearing. Sometimes singing, like salt in a wound, is for staying awake." I said: on this rainy night, until you come, let me hang a lamp in the window... You said: not a lamp — hang your song, like a lamp, in the soul of the window, with no fear of the wind... or... the evil eye. Your song will not be put out... Your song is already more broken than anything they could break again... A song has to be a fresh breath in air that is of today. No bird repeats yesterday's song. The charge of repetition... is in our habit... Love brings the new look with it... Go after fresh, true elements... I thirst for a gaze that is of today, in my old air... I said: I have painted the sounds of today in old spaces... but the blue of the old air I will not hand over to the lead-gray of the new... I only wish that "old poet" too had not looked at my paintings — had seen them, and heard them... Many times... in the cold daybreak.... and... the evening of pain.... "from behind the glass I have looked out at the street" and... the red words of his poem on the black paving of my eye, running headlong... You said nothing... a restless silence was rising out of your eyes... A hand poured a mouthful of wine into a cup... The cup was new, the wine old... You said: drink. Drunkenness knows nothing of time... I love you, paint my voice... and you fell to playing. Your fingers, like rain, were washing every old wall clean... Windows came open, and with each stroke of the plectrum... a bird... went free from the hatch of a cage... With your melodies the swallows turned white, and... the martins, many-coloured... and children were shouting: "We cannot stand the blackness... we want crows the colour of blue" and I... in the square of the laughter of a woman I love, was painting melodies that left Osman — the magician of the dotar, out of Khaf — bewildered... I said: I paint your voice, and... other people's... who love you... the sounds of today in old spaces, or... the spaces of today in old sounds... like your melodies. In the dream I asked the names of your newest pieces. You said: First lullaby for the childhood of Osman of Khaf... and... A glad Faraghi... and... A shepherd's humming for the sparrows of the forest of light... and... A homesickness for the deer and the birds of an old carpet... and... A great elegy for the small fingers of the carpet-weaving girls... I woke from the dream; the sun was up, but... the rain was still falling... Tehran, Azar 1368

Translator's Notes

Hossein Alizadeh (b. 1951) is a composer and a master of the tar and setar, and one of the central figures in what became of Persian classical music after the 1970s — which is what the whole dream-argument between the two men is about. عاشق (âsheq) is not the ghazal's "lover" here but the bardic minstrel of Khorasan, who sings to his own instrument. عثمان is Osman, the dotar master of Khaf in eastern Khorasan; فراغی is the maqâm named for the Turkmen poet Makhtumkuli Fraghi. The four "compositions" the dream-Alizadeh recites are invented inside the poem. جنگل نور is given as "the forest of light," though Nur is a forested county in Mazandaran and may be meant. Two things the Persian does that the English can only point at. شکسته means "broken" and is also the name of a gusheh in Persian classical music, so "your song is already more broken than anything they could break again" is also, exactly, "your song is already in Shekaste." And پنجه is one word for Alizadeh's playing fingers and for the small fingers of the carpet-weaving girls in the last composition — the poem's turn from the master's hand to the children's happens inside a single noun. "The cup was new, the wine old" is the argument in miniature; so is the poet's refusal to trade the blue of the old air for the lead-gray of the new. The line in quotation marks near the end of page 80 belongs to the "old poet" of two lines earlier, unidentified.

December 1989 - آذر ۱۳۶۸ · p. 83

two-explosions

متن اصلی

به همسرم گفتم... با من مهربان نباش... من همیشه شعرم را... در فاصلهٔ دو انفجار گفته‌ام... آذر ۱۳۶۸

Machine

I said to my wife... Don't be kind to me... I have always spoken my poem... in the space between two explosions... Azar 1368

Lantern

I said to my wife... Don't be kind to me... I have always said my poem in the space between two explosions... Azar 1368

November 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۹/۱ · p. 84

sara-bird

متن اصلی

پرنده را با دیوارِ خاکستری نقاشی کردم... روی دیوار، در انبوهِ خاکستری، پرنده... لال مانده بود... نقاشی... بی‌امضاء... کنج کارگاه ماند... یک روز آفتابی دخترم سارا... می‌خواند و نقاشی می‌کرد.... سارا با سرخ نقاشی می‌کرد... از قلم‌مویش یک دانهٔ سرخ کنار پرنده افتاد... سارا ساکت ماند.... پرنده خواند... نقاشی را با رنگِ سبز امضا کردم... سارا دید... سارا خندید... سارا نقاشی را فهمید... ۱۳۶۸/۹/۱

Machine

I painted the bird together with the gray wall... On the wall, in the mass of gray, the bird... had stayed mute... The painting... unsigned... stayed in the corner of the studio... One sunny day my daughter Sara... was singing and painting.... Sara was painting in red... From her brush a single grain of red fell beside the bird... Sara went quiet.... The bird sang... I signed the painting in green... Sara saw... Sara laughed... Sara understood the painting... 1368/9/1

Lantern

I painted the bird together with the gray wall... On the wall, in all that mass of gray, the bird had stayed mute... The painting... unsigned... stayed in the corner of the studio... One sunny day my daughter Sara was singing, and painting.... Sara was painting in red... From her brush one grain of red fell beside the bird... Sara went quiet.... The bird sang... I signed the painting in green... Sara saw... Sara laughed... Sara understood the painting... 1368/9/1

Translator's Notes

A grain of red — دانهٔ سرخ — is what unmutes the bird, and it is the same figure Khosrow Sinai chose to open the preface with: the heart as a pomegranate of a thousand seeds, one of which goes redder when you look at it. Sinai titled his preface The Redness of the Pomegranate Seed. Here a child spills one grain of it into a gray painting and the bird in it sings, at which point the painter can sign — in green.

November 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۹/۷ · p. 85

prison-wall

متن اصلی

نَه... تو را به من راه نمی‌دهند... یک روزِ آفتابی پشتِ دیوار زندانم بیا... سایهٔ تو... دیوار را مهربان‌تر می‌کند. ۱۳۶۸/۹/۷

Machine

No... They will not let you through to me... Some sunny day come to the far side of my prison wall... Your shadow... makes the wall kinder. 1368/9/7

Lantern

No... they will not let you through to me... Some sunny day come to the far side of my prison wall... Your shadow makes the wall kinder. 1368/9/7

Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 86

released-doves

متن اصلی

کبوترانم را رها می‌کنم که باز نگردند... و چون برگردند... با دلهره می‌شمارم... و با غرور... به غریبه‌ای که از راه رسیده است می‌اندیشم... زمستان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

I let my doves go so that they will not come back... And when they do come back... I count them with dread... and with pride... I think of the stranger who has arrived along the road... Winter 1368

Lantern

I let my doves go hoping they will not come back... And when they do come back... I count them with dread... and with pride I think of the stranger who has arrived along the road... Winter 1368

شب یلدا... هجرانی...

Yalda Night... a Night of Parting...

Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 87

yalda-night

متن اصلی

چه شبی بود آن شب... رفته بودی تو... و... بوی خوشِ تو... در دلم دانهٔ حسرت می‌کاشت... یادِ دستانِ تو بر پیکر من سنگ از چشمهٔ اشکم بر می‌داشت... چه شبی بود آن شب... رفتی و یادِ تو ماند... کاش می‌دانستی... تا سحر با یادت... وصل می‌زد... هجران می‌خواند... زمستان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

What a night that night was... You had gone... and... your sweet scent... was planting the seed of regret in my heart... The memory of your hands on my body was lifting the stone from the spring of my tears... What a night that night was... You went, and the memory of you stayed... I wish you had known... until dawn, with your memory... union played... parting sang... Winter 1368

Lantern

What a night that night was... You had gone... and... your sweet scent was sowing the seed of regret in my heart... The memory of your hands on my body lifted the stone off the spring of my tears... What a night that night was... You went, and what stayed was the memory of you... If only you had known — how, till dawn, with your memory, union played... and parting sang... Winter 1368

Translator's Notes

شب یلدا, Yalda, is the winter solstice: the longest night of the year, kept awake in company with poetry and pomegranates. A Yalda that is هجرانی — a Yalda of separation — is the longest night there is, spent apart, and the title says so before the poem starts. The last line makes a duet out of the two states the whole ghazal tradition runs on. وصل, union, and هجران, parting, are given a verb each: union strikes the strings (می‌زد) and parting sings (می‌خواند). One plays, the other sings, and the poet lies awake between them until morning.

Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 88

gray-gaze

متن اصلی

خاکستریِ نگاهِ تو آمیزه‌ای‌ست از سرخِ عشق و... سبزِ آرزو... پیکر زیبای تو از پنجه‌های پا تا... چهارگوش خنده‌ها برای هر که بخواهی نگاهت... نگاهت... برای من... زمستان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

The gray of your gaze is a blend of the red of love and... the green of longing... Your beautiful body, from the toes of your feet to... the square of your laughter, for whomever you wish your gaze... your gaze... for me... Winter 1368

Lantern

The gray of your gaze is a mixture of the red of love and... the green of longing... Your beautiful body, from the toes of your feet to... the four corners of your laughter, for anyone you please — your gaze... your gaze... for me... Winter 1368

Translator's Notes

The opening is a painter's statement of fact before it is a compliment. Red and green are complementaries: mixed, they cancel each other and go gray. So the gray of the gaze is not a dulling of love and longing but exactly what you get when you have both at full strength — which is worth holding beside the poem four pages earlier that ends "I love the grays, / the grays..." چهارگوش خنده‌ها, the four-cornered square of her laughter, is a fixed image of his: it turns up as مربع خنده‌ها in the title poem and again in the letter to Alizadeh, always as a space a face makes that something else can happen inside.

Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 89

river-city

متن اصلی

های... تو را دوست دارم... شهرِ شعرم را در کنار رودِ تو ساختم از من بگذر... رود مرداب نیست اگر بازایستی... ویرانه خواهم شد... زمستان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Hey... I love you... I built the city of my poem beside your river Pass on past me... A river is no marsh if you come to a standstill... I will be left a ruin... Winter 1368

Lantern

Hey... I love you... I built the city of my poem beside your river. Pass me by... A river is no marsh. If you come to a standstill I will be left a ruin... Winter 1368

Translator's Notes

از من بگذر is two things at once: "pass on past me" and "forgive me." The poem needs both readings — he is asking to be flowed past, because a river that stops being a river is a marsh, and the city he built on its bank falls down. Asking the beloved to keep leaving is the same sentence as asking to be forgiven.

December 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۹/۲۷ · p. 90

winter-studio

متن اصلی

کارگاهم... پُرِ مهتابِ زمستانی است... تب دارم... عشق در خاطرم گرم می‌بارد... من نمی‌دانم اَبر، من نمی‌دانم آب، من نمی‌دانم مهتاب... چه رازی دارد... هرچه عاشق‌تر باشی... اَبر غمگین‌تر... آب آبی‌تر... مهتاب... مهتابی‌تر... ۱۳۷۰/۹/۲۷

Machine

My studio... is full of winter moonlight... I have a fever... love rains warm in my memory... I do not know what secret the cloud, I do not know what secret the water, I do not know what secret the moonlight holds... The more in love you are... the sadder the cloud... the bluer the water... the moonlight... the more moonlit... 1370/9/27

Lantern

My studio... is full of winter moonlight... I have a fever... love comes down warm in my memory... I do not know what the cloud, I do not know what the water, I do not know what the moonlight has for a secret... The more in love you are — the sadder the cloud, the bluer the water, the moonlight... the more moonlit... 1370/9/27

Translator's Notes

The last rung of the ladder is a tautology and means to be: cloud goes sadder, water goes bluer, and moonlight simply goes *more moonlit* — مهتاب، مهتابی‌تر. Loving harder does not transform the moonlight into something else; it makes it more entirely what it already was.

Winter 1990 - زمستان ۱۳۶۸ · p. 91

rain-complaint

متن اصلی

باران، تو از آسمان بازمی‌گردی تا قصهٔ دلتنگی خود را برای خاک بگویی... اما بوی کاهگل... مَجال شکوه نمی‌دهد... زمستان ۱۳۶۸

Machine

Rain, you come back down from the sky to tell the earth the story of your own longing... but the smell of straw-and-clay... leaves no room for complaint... Winter 1368

Lantern

Rain, you come back down out of the sky to tell the earth the story of your own homesickness... but the smell of adobe... gives you no opening to complain... Winter 1368

Translator's Notes

Five lines and a complete reversal: the rain descends in order to complain, and what its own arrival releases from the ground — the smell of wet adobe — leaves it nothing to complain about. مجال is the room or opening to do a thing, so the rain is not refuted, it is simply given no gap to speak into.

January 1991 - دی ماه ۱۳۶۹ · p. 92

fifty-springs

متن اصلی

از مشبکِ چشمانت باغِ پاییزی‌ام چه زیباست. آسمانِ خاطرت اما، ابری‌ست. تو به موهایِ سپیدِ من نگاه می‌کنی و به آفتاب می‌اندیشی. یک قطره از نگاهت به چشمانم می‌افتد... من چشمانم را می‌بندم... گرم می‌شوم... و با غرور به تو می‌اندیشم. سبز و سرخ پنجاه بهار... در آسمانِ خاکستری... دی ماه ۱۳۶۹

Machine

Through the lattice of your eyes how beautiful my autumn garden is. But the sky of your memory is clouded. You look at my white hair and think of the sun. A drop from your gaze falls into my eyes... I close my eyes... I grow warm... and with pride I think of you. Green and red, fifty springs... in a gray sky... Dey 1369

Lantern

Seen through the lattice of your eyes how beautiful my autumn garden is. But the sky of your remembering is overcast. You look at my white hair and you think of the sun. One drop out of your gaze falls into my eyes... I close my eyes... I grow warm... and think of you with pride. Green and red, fifty springs... in a gray sky... Dey 1369

Translator's Notes

مشبک is the pierced lattice of a window screen, so her eyes are the grille he sees his own autumn through. The close returns to the arithmetic of gray-gaze four pages earlier: green and red, the two colours that cancel into gray, here fifty springs of them held in one gray sky.

December 1989 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۶ · p. 93

square-laughter

متن اصلی

اگر مربع خنده‌های تو نباشد آرزوهایم را کُجا نقاشی کنم... ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۶

Machine

If the square of your laughter were not there where would I paint my longings... 1368/10/6

Lantern

If the square of your laughter were not there, where would I paint what I long for... 1368/10/6

Translator's Notes

Everywhere else in the book the square of her laughter is a place inside a longer poem — something else happens in it. Here the whole poem is the question of what he would do without it, and the answer is that he would have nowhere to put the painting.

January 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۱۹ · p. 94

wounded-deer

متن اصلی

از شبِ دو چشم تو خورشید سر می‌زند... و... سبزه‌زارِ عشق گرم از نگاهِ تو... غرق در آفتاب. من آهوی شکسته‌دل زخمی توام من را در سایه‌هایِ گیسویِ سبزَت پناه ده... ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۱۹

Machine

Out of the night of your two eyes the sun comes up... and... the green meadow of love, warm from your gaze... drowned in sunlight. I am your broken-hearted, wounded deer — give me shelter in the shadows of your green hair... 1368/10/19

Lantern

Out of the night of your two eyes the sun comes up... and... the meadow of love, warm from your gaze, drowns in sunlight. I am your broken-hearted, wounded deer — shelter me in the shadows of your green hair... 1368/10/19

January 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۲۰ · p. 95

my-rain

متن اصلی

در تمامِ زمستان... به تو می‌اندیشم... تا گرم باشم... و چون بهار بیاید با یادِ تو... سبز خواهم شد... های... بارانِ من... چقدر ترا دوست دارم... ۱۳۶۸/۱۰/۲۰

Machine

All winter long... I think of you... so as to stay warm... and when spring comes with the memory of you... I will turn green... Hey... my rain... how much I love you... 1368/10/20

Lantern

All winter long... I think of you... so as to keep warm... and when spring comes I will turn green with the memory of you... Hey... my rain... how much I love you... 1368/10/20

February 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۲ · p. 96

moon-lantern

متن اصلی

برخیزم فانوسِ ماه را بر تک درختِ پیر بیاویزم و آبِ چشمه را در قوری قدیمی بر آتش بگذارم... مرغی در ساحل می‌خواند و... دستِ ماه بر سینهٔ زاینده‌رود می‌لرزد... من چون آتش گرم... و... چون رود لرزانم و با یادت آواز می‌خوانم... تو با ماهی... تو از طلوعِ آتش در راهی... اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۲

Machine

Let me rise and hang the lantern of the moon on the one old tree and set the spring water in an old teapot on the fire... A bird is singing on the shore and... the hand of the moon trembles on the breast of the Zayandeh-rud... I am warm as fire... and... trembling as the river and with the memory of you I sing... You are with the moon... you are on your way out of the rising of the fire... Isfahan 1368/11/22

Lantern

Let me rise and hang the lantern of the moon on the one old tree, and set the spring water in an old teapot on the fire... A bird is singing on the shore and... the hand of the moon trembles on the breast of the Zayandeh-rud... I am warm as the fire, and... trembling as the river, and I sing with the memory of you... You are with the moon... you are on the road out of the fire's rising... Isfahan 1368/11/22

Translator's Notes

The Zayandeh-rud is Isfahan's river, and this poem and the next are a pair made out of the same four things: the moon, the river, one old tree, and a bridge. The moon is hung on the tree like a lantern here and called the lantern of lovers on the facing page. تو با ماهی can be read two ways and the Persian does not choose: *you are with the moon* (ماه plus the copula) or *you are with the fish*. Moon is taken here because the poem has just hung one in a tree — but a poem sitting on the bank of the Zayandeh-rud can mean fish, and the ambiguity may be the point.

February 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۱ · p. 97

oldest-bridge

متن اصلی

از پشتِ پُل، قدیمی‌ترین پُل چندین هزار بار تو سرکشیده‌ای... و... چندهزار عاشق با دیدنِ تو... آه کشیدند؟... و... چندهزار دیده خط‌های نور را... از اشک تا آبِ رود، تکرار کرده‌اند؟... زاینده‌رود را... ای عابرِ قدیمی ای شاهدِ جوانی پل، فانوسِ عاشقان، ای ماه... ماهِ بزرگ... ماهِ تمام... از پشتِ پل درود... با تک درخت پیر، از پای پل... سلام. اصفهان ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۱

Machine

From behind the bridge, the oldest bridge — how many thousand times have you risen over it... and... how many thousand lovers sighed at the sight of you?... and... how many thousand eyes repeated the lines of light, from tear to river water?... The Zayandeh-rud... O ancient wayfarer, O witness of the bridge's youth, lantern of lovers, O moon... great moon... full moon... a greeting from behind the bridge... with the one old tree, from the foot of the bridge... salaam. Isfahan 1368/11/21

Lantern

From behind the bridge, the oldest bridge — how many thousand times have you risen over it... and... how many thousand lovers sighed at the sight of you?... and... how many thousand eyes have repeated the lines of light from tear to river-water?... The Zayandeh-rud... O ancient wayfarer, O witness of the bridge's youth, lantern of lovers, O moon... great moon... full moon... a greeting from behind the bridge — and with the one old tree, from the foot of the bridge... salaam. Isfahan 1368/11/21

Translator's Notes

Isfahan has a series of old bridges over the Zayandeh-rud; the oldest of them, the Shahrestan, is Sasanian in origin, and the poet does not say which he is standing behind. The moon is addressed as عابرِ قدیمی, an ancient passer-by, and as the witness of the bridge's *youth* — which is the poem's one sharp move: the bridge is the old thing here, and the moon watched it be young. The greeting comes twice and changes language: درود, the old Persian salutation, then سلام. The English keeps the second untranslated so that the poem ends the warmer, more ordinary way it does in Persian.

February 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۵ · p. 98

three-plants

متن اصلی

گفتم سه گیاه را در کویر می‌شناسم... گیاهِ دلتنگِ باران... با رنگِ سبزِ تلخ... گیاهِ هجرانی... به رنگِ مهتابی تاریک... و گیاهِ سوخته... خاکستری و سفید... از تو می‌پرسم... من از کدام گیاهم؟... تو می‌خندی... با نگاهی ابری و خاطری بارانی... تو... می‌دانی... ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۵

Machine

I said I know three plants in the desert... The plant that longs for rain... in a bitter green... The plant of separation... in the color of dark moonlight... and the burnt plant... gray and white... I ask you... which of these plants am I?... You laugh... with a clouded gaze and a rainy heart... You... know... 1368/11/25

Lantern

I said: I know three plants in the desert... the plant homesick for rain, in a bitter green... the plant of separation, the colour of dark moonlight... and the burnt plant... gray and white... I ask you... which of the three am I?... You laugh... with a clouded gaze and a rainy heart... You... know... 1368/11/25

February 1990 - ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۹ · p. 99

osman-saz

متن اصلی

من از تو سیر نخواهم شد... کویر از باران... صدای ساز عثمان می‌آید... من از تو سیر نخواهم شد... کویر تشنهٔ باران است... ببین که می‌آید... صدای خسته عطشان... صدایِ عثمان است... ۱۳۶۸/۱۱/۲۹

Machine

I will never have my fill of you... nor the desert of rain... The sound of Osman's saz is coming... I will never have my fill of you... The desert thirsts for rain... Look — it is coming... the tired, parched voice... it is the voice of Osman... 1368/11/29

Lantern

I will never have my fill of you... nor the desert of rain... The sound of Osman's saz is coming... I will never have my fill of you... The desert is thirsty for rain... Look — it is coming, the tired, thirsting sound... It is the sound of Osman. 1368/11/29

Translator's Notes

The poem turns on a rhyme English cannot keep: عطشان (*atshân*, thirsting) and عثمان (*Osmân*) are one sound apart, so the parched voice the desert is waiting for and the name of the man playing it arrive as very nearly the same word. Osman of Khaf, in eastern Khorasan, is also the dotar player the dream-Alizadeh names in the letter twenty pages earlier.

1990 - ۱۳۶۹ · p. 101

water-trap

متن اصلی

به شوقِ روییدن به دامِ آب افتادم... و رود... رویای دوری بود.... و برکه... حسرتِ بی‌راهی... نسیم دریا به خوابِ من می‌آمد.... و طعمِ لب‌هایم را شورتر می‌کرد.... به شوق روییدن... به تاب افتادم... به دامِ آب افتادم... و ابر... حسرتِ خورشیدِ تشنه... و ابر... روحِ آبِ گریزان از آفتاب... باران... خموش و غمناک... همیشه در برگشت به ابتدای خاک... در آرزوی عبور از هزار ساقهٔ تاک... و داربستِ مو چه ساقه‌هایی داشت.... درخواب‌های کودکیم... زیرِ سایهٔ نمناک، حبابِ ماه را بغل می‌کردم... ۱۳۶۹

Machine

For the longing to sprout I fell into the trap of water... and the river... was a distant dream.... and the pool... the regret of having no road... The sea breeze would come into my sleep.... and make the taste of my lips saltier.... For the longing to sprout... I fell to swaying... I fell into the trap of water... and the cloud... the regret of a thirsty sun... and the cloud... the soul of water in flight from the sunlight... Rain... silent and sorrowful... forever returning to the beginning of earth... longing to pass through a thousand vine-stems... and what stems the grape trellis had.... In the dreams of my childhood... under the damp shade, I held the bubble of the moon in my arms... 1369

Lantern

Out of an ardour to grow I fell into the water's trap... and the river... was a far-off dream.... and the pool... the regret of having no road... The sea breeze would come into my sleep.... and leave the taste of my lips saltier.... Out of an ardour to grow... I fell to swaying... I fell into the water's trap... and the cloud... the regret of a thirsty sun... and the cloud... the soul of water fleeing the sunlight... Rain... silent and sorrowful... forever going back to the beginning of earth... longing to pass through a thousand vine-stems... and what stems that grape trellis had.... In the dreams of my childhood, under the damp shade, I would take the bubble of the moon in my arms... 1369

Translator's Notes

روییدن, to come up as a plant does, is the verb the book keeps returning to — a shadow grows behind the curtain of nothing in Jafari's opening page, a peasant's fortune has grown like a shadow beside his feet in Farrokhi's introduction — and here the ardour to grow is exactly what lands him in the water. دام, the trap, is the word drunk-waterfall uses for the snare of its own white snows, thirty years earlier: the same figure of water held where it does not want to be.

1990 - ۱۳۶۹ · p. 102-103

sparrow-hunter

متن اصلی

با تیر و کمان کودکی‌ام در کوچه باغ‌های قدیمی در انبوه درختان باران‌خورده سینهٔ گنجشکی را نشانه گرفته بودم که عاشق تو شدم. گنجشک بر شانه‌ام نشست و من شکارچی ماهری شدم. از آن پس هرگز به شکار پرنده‌ای نرفته‌ام. هروقت دلتنگم آواز می‌خوانم پرنده می‌آید پرنده می‌نشیند پرنده را می‌بویم پرنده را می‌بوسم پرنده را رها می‌کنم. و چون شکار دیگری می‌شود کودکی‌ام را می‌بینم در کوچه باغ‌های قدیمی در کنار دیوارهای باران‌خورده با بوی کاهگل و آواز پرنده به خود می‌پیچد و گریه می‌کند. های... آواز... چقدر تو را دوست دارم. ۱۳۶۹

Machine

With the bow and arrow of my childhood in the lanes of the old walled gardens in the mass of rain-soaked trees I had taken aim at a sparrow's breast when I fell in love with you. The sparrow settled on my shoulder and I became a skilled hunter. From that day on I have never once gone hunting a bird. Whenever I am lonely I sing the bird comes the bird settles I breathe in the bird I kiss the bird I let the bird go. And when it becomes someone else's prey I see my childhood in the lanes of the old walled gardens beside the rain-soaked walls with the smell of straw-and-clay and the song of a bird — writhing, and weeping. Hey... song... how much I love you. 1369

Lantern

With the bow and arrow of my childhood, in the lanes of the old walled gardens, in the mass of rain-soaked trees, I had taken aim at a sparrow's breast when I fell in love with you. The sparrow settled on my shoulder and I became a skilled hunter. From that day on I have never once gone hunting a bird. Whenever I am lonely I sing — the bird comes, the bird settles, I breathe the bird in, I kiss the bird, I let the bird go. And when it becomes somebody else's kill I see my childhood in the lanes of the old walled gardens, beside the rain-soaked walls, with the smell of adobe and the song of a bird, doubling over, and weeping. Hey... song... how much I love you. 1369

Translator's Notes

**The book's title is on this page, word for word:** با بوی کاهگل و آواز پرنده — *with the smell of adobe and the song of a bird*. Elsewhere the two things are joined by an argument (page 72 claims the one deepens the colour of the other, and the dream-Alizadeh repeats that claim in the letter); only here are they simply set side by side, in the exact phrase that went on the cover. The poem is the book's clearest account of how the man became a poet rather than a hunter: he was aiming at a sparrow's breast when he fell in love, and the sparrow landed on his shoulder instead of dying. What he calls being *a skilled hunter* is having never hunted again — he sings, the bird comes of its own accord, and he lets it go. The grief at the end is not for the bird but for the child in the lanes, who is the one doubled over weeping.

Spring 1990 - بهار ۱۳۶۹ · p. 104-105

look-again

متن اصلی

جانا... دوباره نگاه کن نگاه کردن دیدن نیست... از ابر تا باران... یک قلم فاصله است... یک نفس آبی‌تر... مهتاب خاموش می‌شود. عمری گذشت... تا به چشمِ خود دیدم... چه مشکل است که با چشم خود ببینم. از هر مژه به ساحلِ دیدن راهی‌ست... چه مرزِ حساسی... باریک و تاریک... با کفش‌های شوق، از «مسیر نبضِ عناصر»* عبور کن... در معبری چنین... باید چراغ رنگ به دست بگیریم و در تاریک‌ترین لحظه با نگاهی تَر و ذکر «دوستت دارم» به دنبال پیری بگردیم... و از او چیزی بپرسیم... هر کدام مطلب خود را... در چنین حالی من از او می‌پرسم... اِی پیر... من سال‌هاست در مسیرِ خاکستری‌ام... کِی می‌توانم یک قطره بیشتر با سرخ نقاشی کنم...؟ جانا... تو چه می‌پرسی؟... بهار ۱۳۶۹ *Footnote at the foot of the page:* ‎* سهراب سپهری

Machine

My love... look again — looking is not seeing... From cloud to rain... is one brushstroke's distance... one breath bluer... and the moonlight goes out. A lifetime passed... before I saw with my own eyes... how hard it is to see with my own eyes. From every eyelash to the shore of seeing there is a road... what a delicate border... narrow, and dark... With the shoes of longing, pass through "the path of the pulse of the elements"*... On a crossing like this... we must take up the lamp of color and in the darkest moment, with a wet gaze and the invocation "I love you," go looking for some old man... and ask him something... each of us his own question... In such a state I ask him... O old man... For years now I have been on my gray road... When will I be able to paint one drop more in red...? My love... and what do you ask?... Spring 1369 *Footnote:* * Sohrab Sepehri

Lantern

My love... look again — looking is not seeing... From cloud to rain is one brushstroke's distance... one breath bluer, and the moonlight goes out. A lifetime went by... before I saw with my own eyes how hard it is to see with my own eyes. From every eyelash there is a road to the shore of seeing... what a delicate border, narrow, and dark... In the shoes of longing, cross over by way of "the path of the pulse of the elements"*... On a crossing like that we have to take up the lamp of colour, and at the darkest moment, with a wet gaze and the invocation "I love you," go looking for some old man... and ask him something... each of us his own question... In such a state I ask him: Old man... for years now I have been on my gray road... When will I be able to paint one drop more in red...? My love... and you — what do you ask?... Spring 1369

Translator's Notes

* سهراب سپهری — Sohrab Sepehri (1928–1980), from whom the quoted phrase «مسیر نبضِ عناصر», *the path of the pulse of the elements*, is taken. Sepehri was a painter as well as a poet, which is why a poem addressed to young painters reaches for him: he is the precedent for the whole double life this book is about. ذکر is not simply "saying" — it is the Sufi's repeated invocation, the practice of holding a name in the mouth until it changes you. Putting "I love you" in that slot is the poem's boldest move, and the English keeps "invocation" rather than smoothing it. And the question the old man is asked is the one the book has been circling for twenty pages: after a lifetime on the gray road — the grays he says outright he loves on page 76, the gray that is red and green cancelling on page 88 — when will he be allowed to paint *one drop more in red*. It is the same drop his daughter Sara spilled beside the mute bird on page 84.

March 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱ · p. 106

unfinished-manes

متن اصلی

من باید نقاشی کنم... یالِ اسب‌ها ناتمام است... و... نگاهم به تو... ناتمام تر... سالِ نو رسید... بیا از اولین نگاه... آغاز کنیم... ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱

Machine

I must paint... The manes of the horses are unfinished... and... my gaze toward you... more unfinished still... The new year has come... come, let us begin from the first look... 1369/1/1

Lantern

I have to paint... The manes of the horses are unfinished... and... my gaze toward you, more unfinished still... The new year has come... come, let us begin from the first look... 1369/1/1

March 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱ · p. 107

nowruz-night

متن اصلی

نوروز را از شب آغاز کرده‌ایم... خورشید در راه است... و... دست‌هایم پر از دانه‌های نیلوفر... فردا... بلندترین سایهٔ تو را گل خواهم کاشت... و... با چشمی آفتابی... در انتظار خواهم ماند... ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱

Machine

We have begun Nowruz from the night... The sun is on its way... and... my hands are full of lotus seeds... Tomorrow... I will plant flowers along your longest shadow... and... with a sunlit eye... I will wait... 1369/1/1

Lantern

We have begun Nowruz from the night... The sun is on its way... and... my hands are full of morning-glory seeds... Tomorrow I will plant flowers along your longest shadow... and... with a sunlit eye I will go on waiting... 1369/1/1

Translator's Notes

بلندترین سایهٔ تو را گل خواهم کاشت — *I will plant flowers along your longest shadow* — is a line Jafari had written some thirty years earlier, in the poem that stands here as longest-shadow (page 31), where planting flowers on the beloved's longest shadow is set against nailing a tyrant's shortest shadow to the ground. Here the same sentence is emptied of the politics and planted at Nowruz, at the turn of the year, by a man with his hands full of seed.

April 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱۷ · p. 108-109

not-having

متن اصلی

یکی از کبوترانم برنمی‌گردد، شعری تازه می‌گویم... یکی از کبوترانم می‌میرد، از اندیشه‌ای... سرد... ساکت... و... بی‌کلام... عبور می‌کنم... یکی از کبوتران بیمارم را تنها در قفس... در خونش غلطان می‌بینم... چنان به خشم می‌آیم... که.... کلاغان بر بام نشسته را ضحّاک می‌پندارم. من کی‌ام؟... در مرگِ پرنده‌ام گریه می‌کنم... از دوری کبوترانم غمناک می‌شوم... گاه ساعت‌ها... در کنار دوست شکارچی‌ام برای شکار آهویی در دشت پرسه می‌زنم... و خاطره‌ای خوش از شبی دارم... که گوسفندی را به تمامی... پوست کندیم... بر آتش گرداندیم... و... خوردیم... آنگاه... به شعری لطیف در رثای... یک قناری زرد گوش دادیم... برخیزم... برخیزم همهٔ کبوترانم را رها کنم... نداشتن... تنها راه... از دست ندادن است ۱۳۶۹/۱/۱۷

Machine

One of my doves does not come back, I make a new poem... One of my doves dies, and I pass through a thought... cold... silent... and... wordless... One of my sick doves alone in its cage... I see rolling in its own blood... Such a rage comes over me... that.... I take the crows perched on the roof for Zahhak. Who am I?... I weep at the death of my bird... I turn sorrowful at the absence of my doves... Sometimes for hours... beside my hunter friend I roam the plain to hunt a deer... and I have a fond memory of a night... when we skinned a sheep... whole... turned it over the fire... and... ate it... And then... we listened to a delicate poem in elegy for... a yellow canary... Let me rise... Let me rise and set all my doves free... Not having... is the only way... of not losing. 1369/1/17

Lantern

One of my doves does not come back, and I make a new poem... One of my doves dies, and I pass through a thought... cold... silent... and... wordless... One of my sick doves, alone in its cage... I find rolling in its own blood... Such a rage comes over me... that.... I take the crows perched on the roof for Zahhak. Who am I?... I weep at my bird's death... I go sorrowful when my doves are far off... And sometimes, for hours, beside my hunter friend I roam the plain after a deer... and I keep a fond memory of a night when we skinned a sheep, the whole of it, turned it over the fire... and... ate it... And then... we listened to a delicate poem in elegy for a yellow canary... Let me rise and set all my doves free... Not having... is the only way... of not losing. 1369/1/17

Translator's Notes

ضحّاک — Zahhak, the tyrant of the *Shahnameh* with serpents growing from his shoulders, who was fed on human brains. To take the crows on the roof for Zahhak is to see, in ordinary black birds over a dove's cage, the whole national figure of appetite and cruelty. The poem's question — من کی‌ام؟, *who am I?* — is asked in earnest and not answered. He weeps over a dove and hunts a deer; he remembers a night of skinning and eating a sheep whole with pleasure, and then listening, that same night, to an elegy for a canary. Nothing is reconciled. What arrives instead is the closing line: نداشتن... تنها راه... از دست ندادن است — *not having is the only way of not losing* — which is the answer released-doves (page 86) was already reaching for when it let the doves go hoping they would not come back.

May 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۲/۱۲ · p. 110

doves-know

متن اصلی

همیشه کبوتران پیش از من و تو می‌دانند... همیشه کبوتران بیش از من و تو می‌دانند... هر کبوتری مهتاب را بیشتر از من و تو می‌بیند... روزها دلگیرند.... بیا در مهتاب آغاز کنیم... ۱۳۶۹/۲/۱۲

Machine

Always the doves know before you and I... Always the doves know more than you and I... Every dove sees the moonlight more than you and I do... The days are dreary.... Come, let us begin in the moonlight... 1369/2/12

Lantern

Always the doves know before you and I... Always the doves know more than you and I... Every dove sees the moonlight more than we do... The days are dreary.... Come — let us begin in the moonlight... 1369/2/12

Translator's Notes

Two lines of this poem are identical but for one letter: پیش از, *before*, and بیش از, *more than*. Persian sets them side by side and lets the eye slip between them; English has no pair that close, so the two lines here simply say the two things, one after the other, and the reader has to supply the slippage.

June 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹ · p. 111

longest-breath

متن اصلی

بلندترین نَفَسم، ابری... کوتاه‌ترین نگاهت، آتشی.... به انتظارِ رعدی باش... گوش‌هایم بی‌تابِ صدای تو.... اگر تو نخوانی... وای من... وای تو... ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹

Machine

My longest breath, a cloud... your briefest glance, a fire.... Be waiting for a thunderclap... My ears restless for your voice.... If you do not sing... woe to me... woe to you... 1369/3/29

Lantern

My longest breath, a cloud... your briefest glance, a fire.... Wait for a thunderclap... My ears cannot keep still for your voice.... If you will not sing... then woe to me... and woe to you... 1369/3/29

June 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹ · p. 112

paint-song

متن اصلی

گوش‌هایم در حیرتِ دیدن... چشم‌هایم در حسرتِ شنیدن... ای عشق... من آوازِ تو را نقاشی می‌کنم... ۱۳۶۹/۳/۲۹

Machine

My ears in the wonder of seeing... my eyes in the longing to hear... O love... I am painting your song... 1369/3/29

Lantern

My ears astonished at seeing... my eyes aching to hear... O love — I am painting your song... 1369/3/29

Translator's Notes

Jafari was a painter before he was anything else, and the last line is not only a figure: painting a song is the literal description of his working life. The same crossing runs through pages 129 and 130, where he sees with his ears.

August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۵/۲۶ · p. 113

graft-longing

متن اصلی

بر ساقهٔ بلندِ تمنا با شاخه‌های شوق... پیوند می‌زنم... وقتی صدای... پای تو... از دور می‌رسد... لبخند می‌زنم. ۱۳۶۹/۵/۲۶

Machine

On the tall stalk of longing with the branches of desire... I graft... When the sound... of your footstep... reaches me from afar... I smile. 1369/5/26

Lantern

Onto the tall stalk of longing I am grafting branches of desire... And when the sound of your step carries from far off... I smile. 1369/5/26

دلتنگی برای آواز

Longing for a Song

August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۶/۳ · p. 114

song-lamp

متن اصلی

گفتی... در این شب تاریک تا آمدن تو در پنجره چراغ بیاویزم... من آوازم را همچون چراغ در جانِ پنجره خواهم آویخت، بی‌ترس از باد و نگاهِ بد... آوازِ من خاموش نخواهد شد آواز من شکسته‌تر از آن است که باز هم بشکند... ۱۳۶۹/۶/۳

Machine

You said... in this dark night hang a lamp in the window until you come... I will hang my song like a lamp in the soul of the window, unafraid of the wind and of the evil eye... My song will not be put out — my song is more broken than could ever break again... 1369/6/3

Lantern

You said: in this dark night hang a lamp in the window until I come... So I will hang my song there like a lamp in the very soul of the window, with no fear of the wind or of the evil eye... My song will not be put out. My song is already more broken than anything that could break again... 1369/6/3

August 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۶/۷ · p. 115

every-fire

متن اصلی

بعد از جنگ با هر آتش می‌لرزم... نابود باد همهٔ آتش‌ها مگر، خورشید، مهتاب، فانوس... و شعلهٔ مهربانِ نگاهِ تو... بیا به غار برگردیم، دیوارها منتظرند... و خاطرم پر از تصویرهای تازه است... ۱۳۶۹/۶/۷

Machine

After the war I tremble at every fire... Let all fires be destroyed except the sun, the moonlight, the lantern... and the kind flame of your gaze... Come, let us go back to the cave, the walls are waiting... and my memory is full of fresh images... 1369/6/7

Lantern

After the war every fire makes me shake... Let all fires be destroyed except the sun, the moonlight, the lantern — and the kind flame of your looking... Come, let us go back to the cave. The walls are waiting... and my head is full of new pictures... 1369/6/7

Translator's Notes

The cave whose walls are waiting is the studio: a painter reaching past his own century for the oldest room where images were put on rock. It arrives one line after a wish that every fire on earth be destroyed — and cave painting is made by firelight.

1991 - زمستان ۱۳۶۹ · p. 116

sewn-lips

متن اصلی

با ریسمانِ مهربانِ نگاهِ تو... لب‌هایم را دوختم... اما عشق را... پلک‌ها زمزمه می‌کنند... زمستان ۱۳۶۹

Machine

With the kind rope of your gaze... I sewed my lips shut... But love... the eyelids murmur it... Winter 1369

Lantern

With the kind rope of your looking I sewed my own lips shut... But love — love is what the eyelids murmur... Winter 1369

December 1990 - اصفهان ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۳ · p. 117

nadir-zenith

متن اصلی

در نگاهم آرام... در نَفَسم پرموج... به تو می‌اندیشم... در هر حضیض... در هر اوج... اصفهان ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۳

Machine

In my gaze, calm... in my breath, full of waves... I think of you... in every trough... at every crest... Isfahan 1369/10/3

Lantern

Calm in my looking... full of waves in my breathing... I think of you — at every low point... at every height... Isfahan 1369/10/3

Translator's Notes

حضیض and اوج are the technical pair for the nearest and farthest points of an orbit, and also the ordinary words for the bottom and the top of a life. The English has to choose; it cannot be an astronomical term and a plain word at once.

December 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶ · p. 118

kind-gaze

متن اصلی

در سیاه‌ترین شب‌ها، بر بلندترین دیوارها، از سنگین‌ترین درها، چه آسان می‌توان گذشت وقتی نگاهِ تو... مهربان باشد. ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶

Machine

On the blackest nights, over the highest walls, through the heaviest doors, how easily one can pass when your gaze... is kind. 1369/10/6

Lantern

On the blackest nights, over the highest walls, through the heaviest doors — how easily a man can pass when your looking... is kind. 1369/10/6

December 1990 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶ · p. 119

childhood-walls

متن اصلی

بر چینه‌های کودکی‌ام در معبرِ نسیم نشستم و... نخ‌های باد را... بر بسته‌های خاطره... بستم... ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۶

Machine

On the mud walls of my childhood I sat in the passage of the breeze and... the threads of the wind... to the bundles of memory... I tied... 1369/10/6

Lantern

On the mud walls of my childhood, in the alleyway of the breeze, I sat down and tied the threads of the wind to the bundles of memory... 1369/10/6

January 1991 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۱۹ · p. 120

snow-turtledove

متن اصلی

پنجاه سال است که این قمری بر شاخهٔ پربرف نشسته است. ۱۳۶۹/۱۰/۱۹

Machine

For fifty years now this turtledove has sat on the snow-laden branch. 1369/10/19

Lantern

Fifty years now this turtledove has sat on the snow-laden branch. 1369/10/19

دههٔ شصت بر من چگونه گذشت؟

How Did the Sixties Pass for Me?

1991 - بهمن ۱۳۶۹ · p. 121

sixties-roots

متن اصلی

دههٔ شصت را... در مهتاب شمردم... دوازده بهارِ کوتاه بود.... در یک زمستانِ بلند... در آفتاب شمردم... سیزده زمستانِ کوتاه بود.... در یک بهارِ بلند... اگر ریشه در خاک داری می‌رویی... چه باور کنی چه انکار... برگ‌ها و شاخه‌ها را سرما و گرما می‌سوزاند... اما ریشه‌ها را نه.... می‌پرسی دههٔ شصت چگونه گذشت؟ این ضرب‌المثل را هیچ کجا نشنیده‌ام... «تفنگت را که گرفتند... تیر و کمان کودکی‌ات... خطا نمی‌کند...» بهمن ۱۳۶۹ در پاسخ به مجلهٔ گردون

Machine

The Sixties... I counted them in the moonlight... they were twelve short springs.... inside one long winter... I counted them in the sunlight... they were thirteen short winters.... inside one long spring... If your root is in the soil, you grow... whether you believe it or deny it... Cold and heat burn the leaves and the branches... but not the roots.... You ask how the Sixties passed? I have never heard this proverb anywhere... "Once they have taken your rifle... the bow and arrow of your childhood... does not miss...." Bahman 1369, in reply to Gardoon magazine

Lantern

The Sixties — I counted them by moonlight... twelve short springs inside one long winter... I counted them by sunlight... thirteen short winters inside one long spring... If your root is in the soil, you grow, whether you believe it or deny it... Cold and heat burn the leaves and the branches but they do not burn the roots.... You ask me how the Sixties passed? I have never heard this proverb anywhere — "Once they have taken your rifle... the bow and arrow of your childhood... does not miss...." Bahman 1369

Translator's Notes

دههٔ شصت is the Iranian ۱۳۶۰s — roughly 1981 to 1991 — which is to say the whole of the war with Iraq and the three years after it. It is not the Gregorian sixties, and the poem is unreadable if it is taken that way. The date line names an occasion: *Bahman 1369, in reply to Gardoon magazine.* The poem is an answer to a commission, which is why it opens by restating the question it was asked. The last three lines are in quotation marks and introduced as a proverb the poet says he has never heard anywhere — his way of coining one and disowning it in the same breath. The bow and arrow come back on page 183, where an old man goes down the road looking for his childhood's.

March 1991 - ۱۳۶۹/۱۲/۲۴ · p. 122

restless-cloud

متن اصلی

همیشه باران برای روییدن نیست... گاه پنجه‌های باران... نسیم را می‌نوازد... و گاه... همراهِ تند باد... ویرانه می‌کند... نگاهِ تو پنجره‌ای‌ست به خاطرهٔ خواستن... با هم ساختن... با هم سوختن نیست.... عشق... در سرزمینِ شوق می‌رویاند... و در دشتِ هوس خشک می‌کند... ای ابرِ بی‌قرار... این بار... ساقهٔ شوقم... من را دوباره نگاه کن... ۱۳۶۹/۱۲/۲۴

Machine

Rain is not always for growing... Sometimes the fingers of the rain... play upon the breeze... and sometimes... alongside the gale... they make a ruin... Your gaze is a window onto the memory of wanting... To build together... is not to burn together.... Love... makes things grow in the land of longing... and dries them up in the plain of appetite... O restless cloud... this time... my stalk of longing... look at me again... 1369/12/24

Lantern

Rain is not always for growing... Sometimes the fingers of the rain play over the breeze, and sometimes, riding the gale, they leave a ruin behind... Your looking is a window onto the memory of wanting... To build together is not to burn together.... Love makes things grow in the country of longing and dries them up on the plain of appetite... O restless cloud — this time... my stalk of longing... look at me again... 1369/12/24

1990s - دههٔ ۱۳۷۰ · p. 123

fire-water

متن اصلی

دلِ شب بود و باران بود و مهتاب تن و پیراهنش از آب بی‌تاب کنارش رفتم از عطرِ تنش مست نشستم مثل آتش بر لبِ آب دههٔ ۱۳۷۰

Machine

It was the heart of night, and rain, and moonlight, her body and her dress restless with water; I went to her side, drunk on the scent of her, and sat down like fire on the lip of the water. The 1370s

Lantern

It was the heart of the night, and rain, and moonlight; her body and her dress were restless with the water. I went to her side, drunk on the scent of her, and sat down like a fire on the water's lip. The 1370s

Translator's Notes

A rhymed quatrain in the classical manner, dropped in among the free verse — one of a handful in this part of the book. The Persian rhymes مهتاب / بی‌تاب / آب on the same syllable three times; the English keeps the shape and lets the rhyme go.

1990s - دههٔ ۱۳۷۰ · p. 124

memory-dust

متن اصلی

یک مرد، یک سنگ، و تنهٔ پیر یک درخت و در زمینه، مِهی غلیظ... یک خطِ کوتاهِ آبی... یک نقطهٔ کوچکِ سرخ. ای کاش خاطره... مثلِ ابر می‌بارید.... مثلِ خورشید می‌تابید... و چون غبار... گم نمی‌شد... دههٔ ۱۳۷۰

Machine

One man, one stone, and the old trunk of a tree and in the background, a thick mist... one short blue line... one small red dot. If only memory... rained down like the cloud.... blazed like the sun... and did not, like dust... get lost... The 1370s

Lantern

One man, one stone, the old trunk of a tree, and in the background a thick mist... one short blue line... one small red dot. If only memory rained down like the cloud.... blazed like the sun... and did not get lost the way dust does... The 1370s

Translator's Notes

The opening is a picture being catalogued rather than a scene being witnessed — a man, a stone, a tree, a ground, and then two marks named only by colour and size. The poem is looking at its author's other work.

1991 - ۱۳۷۰ · p. 125

mirror-pool

متن اصلی

اِی ساکتِ صبور ای ابر، ابرِ دور ای دشتِ سبز ای برکهٔ کبود... با شور و حال من زیبا و روشنی... بی جلوه‌های شوق، غمگین‌تر از منی. هر صبح هر غروب با حنجرِ سکوت فریاد می‌زنی من آینهٔ توام تو آینهٔ منی... ۱۳۷۰

Machine

O patient silent one O cloud, far cloud O green plain O dark-blue pool... With my ardour in you you are lovely and lit... without the flashes of longing, you are sadder than I am. Every morning every dusk with the throat of silence you cry out — I am your mirror, you are mine... 1370

Lantern

O silent patient one, O cloud, far cloud, O green plain, O dark blue pool — with my ardour in you you are lovely and lit; without the flash of longing you are sadder than I am. Every morning, every dusk, with the throat of silence you cry out: I am your mirror, you are mine... 1370

1991 - فروردین ۱۳۷۰ · p. 126

dove-apprentice

متن اصلی

هشت سال... شاگردی کبوتران کردم... پرواز نیاموختم... پروازِ بی‌بال... مثلِ آوازِ بی‌حال... مثلِ شعر... مثلِ نقاشی... اگر عاشق نباشی... آموختنی نیست... فروردین ۱۳۷۰

Machine

Eight years... I apprenticed myself to the doves... I did not learn to fly... Flight without wings... is like a song without spirit... like a poem... like a painting... If you are not in love... it cannot be taught... Farvardin 1370

Lantern

Eight years I served my apprenticeship to the doves. I never learned to fly. Flight without wings is like a song with no spirit in it, like a poem... like a painting... If you are not in love, it cannot be taught... Farvardin 1370

Translator's Notes

Eight years is the exact length of the war, Shahrivar ۱۳۵۹ to Mordad ۱۳۶۷. The doves are the ones he lets go at the close of *not-having*, on the last page of the previous batch.

April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳ · p. 129

voice-colours

متن اصلی

تو را دوباره نگاه کردم... دوباره مژگان را... درون برکهٔ مهتاب شستشو دادم... تو را نگاه کردم... و پلک‌های تَرَم را... در آبِ چشمهٔ دیدن... چنان صفا دادم... که... رنگ‌های صدایت را... بگوش می‌دیدم... و با نگاه ترم... بر لبانِ بیدارت.... هزار گفتهٔ گرمِ خموش می‌دیدم... لبانِ تو می‌دید... و چشم‌های تو در گوشه‌های بیداری... ترانه‌ای می‌خواند... کلام سبزِ ترِ عاشقانه‌ای می‌خواند... ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳

Machine

I looked at you again... Again I washed my lashes... in the pool of the moonlight... I looked at you... and my wet eyelids... in the water of the spring of seeing... I rinsed so clear... that... the colours of your voice... I saw with my ear... and with my wet gaze... on your waking lips.... I saw a thousand warm silent sayings... Your lips were seeing... and your eyes in the corners of wakefulness... were singing a song... were singing a green wet word of love... 1370/1/13

Lantern

I looked at you again... Again I washed my lashes in the pool of the moonlight... I looked at you, and rinsed my wet eyelids in the water of the spring of seeing until they ran so clear that I saw the colours of your voice with my ear... and with that wet looking, on your waking lips, I saw a thousand warm silent sayings... Your lips were seeing... and your eyes, in the corners of being awake, were singing a song — were singing a green wet word of love... 1370/1/13

Translator's Notes

*I saw the colours of your voice with my ear* is not a slip. The senses swap places all through this pair of poems — the eyes sing, the lips see, the ears do the looking — and the poem on the facing page ends with ears that are still seeing.

April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳ · p. 130

ear-embrace

متن اصلی

عبور می‌کردم... به وسعتِ یک دشت... به زیرِ تابشِ رنگین‌کمان آوازت کنار شاخه‌ای از لحظه‌های تُردِ سبز... خموش گشتم و... آغوش گوش وا کردم... دویدم از چمنِ شوق... تا... تَهِ باران... در اولِ خورشید... هنوز گوش‌هایم می‌دید... صدا رها کردم... تو را... صدا کردم... ۱۳۷۰/۱/۱۳

Machine

I was passing through... wide as a plain... under the rainbow-glow of your singing, beside a branch of tender green moments... I fell silent and... opened the embrace of my ear... I ran from the meadow of longing... to... the far end of the rain... at the first of the sun... my ears were seeing still... I let my voice go... I called... to you... 1370/1/13

Lantern

I was passing through, wide as a plain, under the rainbow of your singing, beside a branch of tender green moments. I fell silent and opened the arms of my ear. I ran from the meadow of longing to the far end of the rain, and at the first of the sun my ears were seeing still. I let my voice go — I called out to you... 1370/1/13

April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۲۹ · p. 132

highest-peak

متن اصلی

چه کوتاه می‌نماید بلندترین قلهٔ جهان، در حافظهٔ ابر، در خاطرهٔ باران... ۱۳۷۰/۱/۲۹

Machine

How short it looks, the highest peak in the world, in the memory of the cloud, in the memory of the rain... 1370/1/29

Lantern

How short it looks, the highest peak on earth, in the memory of the cloud, in the memory of the rain... 1370/1/29

April 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۱/۳۱ · p. 133-134

village-nights

متن اصلی

شب‌ها وقتی به یاد دهکده می‌افتم دیوار سیمانی در خواب کاهگل و سقف بی پرستو در نقشِ آسمان بی ابر بی‌ستاره. یخچالِ روح زنجره‌ای در باران با خواندنی مَقطع و محزون شب‌ها وقتی به یاد دهکده می‌افتم یک شیر نیم‌بسته چشمهٔ جوشان و از همه عجیب تر یک ساق نیم‌خوردهٔ ریحان که عطر آن با یک نفس به عمق هزاران هزار لای تا انتهای جان. ای آن به ساحتِ معطر باران بر بال‌های پرطراوت باران جسم مرا به دهکده برگردان. همزادِ شادِ کودکیم تنهاست در آب‌های تشنهٔ سرگردان. شب‌ها وقتی به یاد دهکده می‌افتم آغوش و نان نرم و تنور گرم می‌خوانمت دوباره تو را ای جان هیهات صبح و بویِ خوشِ خشخاش هیهات خاک و زمزمهٔ باران ۱۳۷۰/۱/۳۱

Machine

Nights when the village comes back to me — a cement wall dreaming it is adobe and a swallowless roof in the figure of the sky cloudless, starless. The icehouse of the soul, a cicada in the rain with its broken and mournful singing. Nights when the village comes back to me — a half-closed tap, a spring at the boil, and strangest of all a half-eaten stalk of basil whose scent, on one breath, goes down through thousands upon thousands of folds to the very end of the soul. O you — in the perfumed precinct of the rain, on the fresh-feathered wings of the rain, carry my body back to the village. The glad twin of my childhood is alone in the thirsty wandering waters. Nights when the village comes back to me — an embrace, and soft bread, and a warm oven — I call you again, I call you, O life. How far off the morning and the sweet smell of poppy, how far off the earth and the murmuring of the rain. 1370/1/31

Lantern

Nights, when the village comes back to me: a cement wall dreaming it is adobe, a swallowless roof in the shape of the sky, cloudless, starless. The icehouse of the soul — a cicada in the rain with its broken mournful singing. Nights, when the village comes back to me: a half-closed tap, a spring at the boil, and strangest of all a half-eaten stalk of basil whose scent goes down on one breath through thousands upon thousands of folds to the very end of the soul. O you — in the perfumed precinct of the rain, on the fresh-feathered wings of the rain, carry my body back to the village. The glad twin of my childhood is alone in the thirsty wandering waters. Nights, when the village comes back to me: an embrace, soft bread, a warm oven — I call you again, I call you, O life. How far off the morning and the sweet smell of poppy. How far off the earth and the murmuring of the rain. 1370/1/31

Translator's Notes

One poem across two printed pages; the page break falls after *the village comes back to me*, which is also the line the poem keeps returning to, so the break and the refrain land together. هیهات, twice in the last two lines, is a classical exclamation with no real English equivalent — it means both *alas* and *how impossibly far*. 'How far off' takes the second sense because the whole poem is about distance from a place rather than grief at it.

May 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۲/۱۲ · p. 135

counting-years

متن اصلی

تو سال‌های زندگی را می‌شماری... من زندگی سال‌ها را... ۱۳۷۰/۲/۱۲

Machine

You count the years of life... I, the life of the years... 1370/2/12

Lantern

You count the years of life. I count the life of the years. 1370/2/12

1991 - زلزله رودبار ۱۳۷۰ · p. 136

earthquake-firefly

متن اصلی

در شبِ زلزله... ماه در چشمِ کرمِ شب‌تاب بارانی از مهتاب شد... و... بر آوارها ریخت... کرم شب‌تاب توان نداشت تا بشنود غم‌انگیزترین هم‌سرایی را... از مردمی که هرگز... چنین یک دل با هم نخوانده‌اند... تا... آخرین نفس... زلزله رودبار ۱۳۷۰

Machine

On the night of the earthquake... the moon, in the eye of the firefly, turned to a rain of moonlight... and... poured down over the rubble... The firefly had not the strength to hear the most grief-stricken chorus of all... from a people who had never... sung so much of one heart together... until... the last breath... The Rudbar earthquake, 1370

Lantern

On the night of the earthquake the moon, in the eye of the firefly, turned into a rain of moonlight and poured down over the rubble... The firefly had not the strength to hear the most grief-stricken chorus of all — from a people who had never sung so much of one heart together until the last breath... The Rudbar earthquake, 1370

Translator's Notes

The Rudbar-Manjil earthquake destroyed a stretch of Gilan and Zanjan in the small hours of 31 Khordad ۱۳۶۹ — 21 June 1990 — and killed something like forty thousand people. The poem's own date line says ۱۳۷۰, a year later than the event; whether that is the poet dating the writing or a slip in the printing, the book does not say. The chorus is the sound of the buried and the digging, heard as singing — a people who had never been so much of one voice, and are so only now.

November 1991 - ۱۳۷۰/۹/۵ · p. 137

two-shadows

متن اصلی

کبوتر در باران... کبوتر در آب... کبوتر در باد... کبوتر در خواب... کبوتر در مهتاب... هر کبوتر دو سایه دارد، سایه‌ای در آفتاب... سایه‌ای در مهتاب... سایه آفتابیش شاعر است... سایه مهتابیش عاشق... سایهٔ آفتابی از پرواز کبوتر می‌گریزد... سایهٔ مهتابی برای آوازِ کبوتر دانه می‌ریزد... آه ای دل... کبوترِ بی‌تاب... بی‌تاب در آتش... بی‌تاب در آب... بی‌تاب در خواب... بی‌تاب در مهتاب... ۱۳۷۰/۹/۵

Machine

A dove in the rain... a dove in the water... a dove in the wind... a dove in sleep... a dove in the moonlight... Every dove has two shadows, one shadow in the sunlight... one shadow in the moonlight... Its sun-shadow is a poet... its moon-shadow a lover... The sun-shadow flees the dove's flight... the moon-shadow scatters grain for the dove's song... Ah, my heart... restless dove... restless in the fire... restless in the water... restless in sleep... restless in the moonlight... 1370/9/5

Lantern

A dove in the rain, a dove in the water, a dove in the wind, a dove in sleep, a dove in the moonlight. Every dove has two shadows: one in the sunlight, one in the moonlight. Its sun-shadow is a poet. Its moon-shadow is a lover. The sun-shadow runs from the dove's flight; the moon-shadow scatters grain for the dove's song. Ah, my heart — restless dove, restless in the fire, restless in the water, restless in sleep, restless in the moonlight... 1370/9/5

April 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹ · p. 138

passing-cloud

متن اصلی

ای ابرِ عابر... از ماه بگذر... بی مهتاب... سایه‌ها می‌میرند... شعر چوپانیم را در دشت خواندم... شبان... گوسفندانش را رها کرد... پونه‌ها را بویید... آنقد گریه کرد... تا... بی‌مهتاب به خواب رفت... ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹

Machine

O passing cloud... move off the moon... Without moonlight... the shadows die... I sang my shepherd's poem out on the plain... The shepherd... let his sheep go... He smelled the pennyroyal... He wept so long... that... he fell asleep with no moonlight on him... 1371/1/29

Lantern

O passing cloud — get off the moon. Without moonlight the shadows die... I sang my shepherd's poem out on the plain. The shepherd let his sheep go, smelled the pennyroyal, and wept so long that he fell asleep with no moonlight on him... 1371/1/29

April 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹ · p. 139

without-moonlight

متن اصلی

ای ابر... زودتر بگذر... من بی‌مهتاب... می‌میرم... ۱۳۷۱/۱/۲۹

Machine

O cloud... pass over sooner... Without moonlight... I die... 1371/1/29

Lantern

O cloud — pass over sooner. Without moonlight... I die... 1371/1/29

1992 - تیر ۱۳۷۱ · p. 140

white-jasmine

متن اصلی

بوی یاسِ سپید را شمعدانی‌هایم شنیدند... سرخ تر شدند... یاسِ سپیدِ من... کم‌رنگم... تیر ۱۳۷۱

Machine

The scent of the white jasmine — my geraniums heard it... They went redder... My white jasmine... and I, gone pale... Tir 1371

Lantern

The scent of the white jasmine — my geraniums heard it and went redder. My white jasmine... and I, gone pale... Tir 1371

September 1992 - ۱۳۷۱/۷/۶ · p. 141

glass-greenhouse

متن اصلی

گل در گلخانه فصل را گم می‌کند، و... گیاه... در حجمِ شیشه‌ای؛ ناباورانه... زمستان را. مرا از پنجره‌ات مران... زمستان سختی پشت شیشه‌هاست. گیاه در گل‌خانه فصل را از یاد می‌بَرَد... من در هوایِ تو... کاش سهراب را می‌دیدم... بی‌گمان... اکنون می‌داند... تا طلوع انگور... چند ساعت راه است. ۱۳۷۱/۷/۶

Machine

The flower in the greenhouse loses the season, and... the plant... inside a volume of glass; disbelieving... loses the winter. Do not drive me from your window... There is a hard winter behind the panes. The plant in the greenhouse forgets the season... and I, in the air of you... If only I had seen Sohrab... Beyond doubt... he knows by now... how many hours' walking it is to the rising of the grape. 1371/7/6

Lantern

The flower in the greenhouse loses the season, and the plant, inside its volume of glass, disbelieving, loses the winter. Do not drive me from your window — there is a hard winter behind the panes. The plant in the greenhouse forgets the season; I, in the air of you... If only I had seen Sohrab. Beyond doubt he knows by now how many hours' walking it is to the rising of the grape. 1371/7/6

Translator's Notes

Sohrab Sepehri — poet and painter, dead in 1980 — is one of the presences this part of the book keeps circling. He is named outright here, his collection *The Green Volume* gives page 143 its dateline, and page 161 drinks 'Sohrab's gift, the water in the moon-filled glass.' The word حجم, *volume*, is Sepehri's: the glass volume the plant sits inside is his title, put in the poem two lines before his name.

1993 - ۱۳۷۲ · p. 142

broken-cage

متن اصلی

وقتی قفس شکست... و... در خاطرِ پرنده... تصویرِ اوج نقش بست... موجی به رنگ خواستن آغاز می‌شود پرهای شوق... در بال‌های تجربه... بی آن که پرکشد پرواز می‌شود... بر این مدار... بی‌دید... بی‌امید... این‌سان که ما به دستِ دعا سرنهاده‌ایم... گویی کنارِ هم... چون میله‌های یک قفسِ تنگ ایستاده‌ایم... یک... یک... جدا... مقابل هم... جای خنده است... وقتی که یک قفس... در انتظار معجزهٔ یک پرنده است... ۱۳۷۲

Machine

When the cage broke... and... in the bird's memory... the image of the height took shape... a wave the colour of wanting begins. The feathers of longing... in the wings of experience... without a single beat, become flight... On this orbit... sightless... hopeless... the way we have laid our heads in the hand of prayer... it is as if side by side... like the bars of one narrow cage, we are standing... one... by one... apart... facing one another... It is a thing to laugh at... when a cage... sits waiting for the miracle of a bird... 1372

Lantern

When the cage broke, and in the bird's memory the image of the height took shape, a wave the colour of wanting begins. The feathers of longing, in the wings of experience, become flight without one beat of a wing... On this orbit, sightless, hopeless, the way we have laid our heads in the hand of prayer — it is as though we stood side by side like the bars of one narrow cage, one by one, apart, facing each other. It is a thing to laugh at, when a cage sits waiting for the miracle of a bird... 1372

Translator's Notes

The turn comes in the last two lines and reverses everything before it: the bird has been the one waiting to be freed, and it is the cage that is found waiting for a miracle.

1993 - در کارگاه حجم سبز ۱۳۷۲ · p. 143

gardener-seed

متن اصلی

باغبان، سبز شدن را، به گیاه نمی‌آموزد... باغبان، نشانی بهار را به دانه... و... نامهٔ باران را به سبزه می‌دهد... نمی‌توان، به پرنده یاد داد، که... در کویر... یا... برگ بید... لانه بسازد... من باغبانم... اگر دانهٔ شوقی در توست... آن را خواهم رویاند... در کارگاه حجم سبز ۱۳۷۲

Machine

The gardener does not teach the plant how to go green... The gardener gives the seed the address of spring... and... gives the grass the letter of the rain... You cannot teach a bird to... build its nest... in the desert... or... on a willow leaf... I am a gardener... If there is a seed of longing in you... I will bring it up... At the Green Volume workshop, 1372

Lantern

A gardener does not teach the plant how to go green. A gardener hands the seed the address of spring and hands the grass the letter of the rain. You cannot teach a bird to build its nest in the desert, or on a willow leaf. I am a gardener. If there is a seed of longing in you, I will bring it up... At the Green Volume workshop, 1372

Translator's Notes

*The Green Volume* — حجم سبز — is Sohrab Sepehri's 1967 collection, and the workshop in the dateline is named after it. The poem is about teaching, written from a room named for another poet's book, by a man who says a teacher can only give directions and wait.

May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲ · p. 144

seize-moment

متن اصلی

ابرِ سیاهِ دغدغه را از کوه شانه‌ها بران برخیز ای شاخهٔ جوان کِی وقت خفتن است... این لحظه... لحظه... را دریاب... برگ... برگِ بهارِ لب‌هایت بی‌رگبارِ بوسه‌ها، در سفرِ پاییز است... چون آفتاب برتاب... و عاشقانه درآمیز... با خاک... با باد... با آتش با آب... دریاب... دیر است... لحظه را دریاب. ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲

Machine

Drive the black cloud of worry off the mountain of your shoulders. Rise, young branch — when was it ever the hour for sleeping... This moment... this moment... take hold of it... Leaf... the spring leaf of your lips, with no cloudburst of kisses, is travelling into autumn... Blaze out like the sun... and mingle like a lover... with earth... with wind... with fire, with water... Take hold... it is late... Take hold of the moment. 1372/2/12

Lantern

Drive the black cloud of worry off the mountain of your shoulders. Rise, young branch — when was it ever the hour for sleeping? This moment — this moment — take hold of it. Leaf, the spring leaf of your lips, with no cloudburst of kisses on it, is already travelling into autumn. Blaze out like the sun and mingle like a lover with earth, with wind, with fire, with water. Take hold — it is late. Take hold of the moment. 1372/2/12

May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲ · p. 145

dew-deer

متن اصلی

ابر شبنم شد.... بر دشت نشست.... آهویی تند گذشت.... زیر پایِ آهو شبنم له شد.... گفت نشینم... برخیزم... یاد دریا افتاد... عشق پیدا شد و... شبنم... مِه... ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۲

Machine

The cloud became dew.... It settled on the plain.... A deer went past at speed.... Under the deer's foot the dew was crushed.... It said: shall I settle... shall I rise... It remembered the sea... Love came to light and... dew... became mist... 1372/2/12

Lantern

clouds became dew... she sat on the prairie... A deer passed hurridly... crushed dew beneath hoof... she said - don't sit... I rose... she remembered the sea... found love... and... dew..... fog...

Translator's Notes

The whole life of the poem is four seconds long: a cloud settles as dew, a deer treads on it, and the crushed drop remembers the sea it came from and goes back up as mist. The Persian گفت نشینم... برخیزم can be the dew asking itself whether to stay or rise, or an instruction given to it; the poem does not settle which.

May 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۶ · p. 146

father-fire

متن اصلی

پدرم پای آتش آواز خواند... تن آتش... دود شد... جانِ آتش ماند... ۱۳۷۲/۲/۱۶

Machine

My father sang at the foot of the fire... The body of the fire... turned to smoke... The soul of the fire stayed... 1372/2/16

Lantern

My father sang at the foot of the fire. The body of the fire turned to smoke. The soul of the fire stayed. 1372/2/16

June 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۳/۱۶ · p. 147

father-silences

متن اصلی

پدرم... دو سکوت داشت، یک فریاد... دو لبخند... یکی غمگین... یکی شاد... غم را به دیاری دور... به خواهرانم فرستاد... برایش آواز خواندم... غمِ عشق را به من داد... ۱۳۷۲/۳/۱۶

Machine

My father... had two silences, one cry... two smiles... one of them sorrowful... one glad... The sorrow he sent away to a far country... to my sisters... I sang for him... and he gave me the sorrow of love... 1372/3/16

Lantern

My father had two silences and one cry, two smiles — one of them sorrowful, one glad. The sorrow he sent to a far country, to my sisters. I sang for him, and he gave me the sorrow of love. 1372/3/16

August 1993 - محمودآباد ۱۳۷۲/۵/۲۱ · p. 148

old-stalk

متن اصلی

زیر پایم گُل... آسمانم بارانِ باریده... ابر... و... دلم گلدانی... ساقه‌هایِ عشق... برگ‌هایِ باد... عطری از خاطرهٔ خندهٔ تو... در شبی هذیانی... خواب می‌بینم... چوب سیگاری... با نفس‌های تو پربرگ شده است... باز هم این گلدان را... در هوای تو رها خواهم کرد... هرچه بادا... باد... ساق پیرم... اما... با نفس‌هایِ تو... گُل خواهم داد... محمودآباد ۱۳۷۲/۵/۲۱

Machine

Under my feet, a flower... my sky, rain already fallen... cloud... and... my heart a flowerpot... The stalks of love... the leaves of the wind... a scent out of the memory of your laughter... On a delirious night... I dream... a cigarette holder... has come into leaf with your breath... Once again I will let this pot... go loose in the air of you... Come what... may... My stalk is old... and yet... with your breath... I will flower... Mahmudabad 1372/5/21

Lantern

A flower under my feet, my sky the rain already fallen — cloud — and my heart a flowerpot: stalks of love, leaves of wind, a scent out of the memory of your laughing. On a delirious night I dream that a cigarette holder has come into leaf with your breath. Once more I will let this pot go loose in the air of you. Come what may. My stalk is old — and even so, with your breath on it, I will flower... Mahmudabad 1372/5/21

August 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۶/۳ · p. 150-151

walnut-leaf

متن اصلی

شاید این بلبل که می‌خواند منم آن یکی شاید که بوی یاس‌ها را دوست می‌دارد. من همهٔ خود نیستم قسمتی از ابر شاید چند برگ از شاخهٔ گردو. خط‌خطی‌هایی درون ماه می‌بینم که روزی در نگاه دختری هم بود، هر دو لحنی مثل یک آواز را دارند مثل یک آواز ناخوانده. خط‌خطی‌ها را سعی خواهم کرد میهمان حنجرم باشند، بخشی از مهتاب یک شب قسمتی از ابر روزی میهمانِ حنجر مَحزون سیما بود. شاید این بلبل که می‌خواند آن یکی شاید که بوی یاس‌ها را دوست می‌دارد من نباشم دیگری باشد دوستی با نام اصغر که همیشه در سکوتش حالِ خواندن داشت... رفت یک شب جای دیگر حالِ ماندن داشت. رفت یک شب مثل برگ از شاخهٔ گردو رفت یک شب مثل عطر از خاطرِ شب بو ۱۳۷۲/۶/۳

Machine

Perhaps this nightingale that is singing is me, or perhaps that other one, the one who loves the smell of the jasmines. I am not all of myself — part cloud, perhaps, a few leaves off the walnut branch. I see scribblings inside the moon that were once in a girl's eyes as well; both carry a tone like one same song, like one song never sung. The scribblings — I will try to make them guests of my throat; a share of one night's moonlight, a part of some day's cloud, was the guest of Sima's mournful throat. Perhaps this nightingale that is singing, or perhaps that other one, the one who loves the smell of the jasmines, is not me — is someone else, a friend by the name of Asghar, who always, in his silence, had a singing in him... He went, one night — Somewhere else, he had a staying in him. He went, one night, like a leaf off the walnut branch; he went, one night, like scent out of the memory of the night-stock. 1372/6/3

Lantern

Perhaps this nightingale that is singing is me, or perhaps it is the other one, the one who loves the smell of the jasmines. I am not all of myself — part cloud, perhaps, a few leaves off the walnut branch. I see scribblings inside the moon that were once in a girl's eyes as well; both carry a tone like one same song, like one song never sung. The scribblings — I will try to make them guests of my throat; a share of one night's moonlight, a part of some day's cloud, was once the guest of Sima's mournful throat. Perhaps this nightingale that is singing, or perhaps that other one, the one who loves the smell of the jasmines, is not me at all — is someone else, a friend by the name of Asghar, who always had a singing in his silence... He went, one night. Somewhere else, he had a staying in him. He went, one night, like a leaf off the walnut branch. He went, one night, like scent out of the memory of the night-stock. 1372/6/3

Translator's Notes

An elegy that spends twenty lines refusing to say who it is about. The nightingale might be the poet, might be someone else; only at the end does the someone else get a name, and by then he has already gone. سیما is either a woman's name or the ordinary word for a face. The line will carry both and the printed text does not choose.

September 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۶/۲۶ · p. 152

shadowless-leaf

متن اصلی

به خاکِ غمَت نشانده‌ام... با هزار ریشه... سبز شدم... برگم بی‌سایه شد، تا خورشید را از خاک نگیرد... و... هیچ روییده‌ای... در خاک نمیرد. ۱۳۷۲/۶/۲۶

Machine

Planted in the soil of your sorrow... with a thousand roots... I came up green... My leaf turned shadowless, so as not to take the sun from the earth... and so... that nothing which has grown... should die in the soil. 1372/6/26

Lantern

Planted in the soil of your sorrow, with a thousand roots I came up green. My leaf turned shadowless so as not to take the sun from the earth, so that nothing which has grown should die in the soil. 1372/6/26

Translator's Notes

The leaf gives up its own shadow so that nothing underneath it goes without light — a plant that refuses the one advantage of being tall.

1994 - ۱۳۷۳ · p. 153

cage-song

متن اصلی

کبوتر در قفس... آنقدر خواند... تا سایه‌اش را از قفس بیرون راند، سایه، نوری بر کبوتر تاباند... کبوتر... وردِ آزادی را از بر کرد... سایهٔ قفس بر کبوتر افتاد... پرهایش را زیباتر کرد... کبوتر ماند... کبوتر خواند... کبوترها را لرزاند. ۱۳۷۳

Machine

The dove in the cage... sang so long... that it drove its own shadow out through the bars, and the shadow shone a light back on the dove... The dove... learned the spell of freedom by heart... The shadow of the cage fell across the dove... and made its feathers lovelier... The dove stayed... The dove sang... and set all the doves trembling. 1373

Lantern

The dove in the cage sang so long that it drove its own shadow out through the bars, and the shadow shone a light back on the dove. The dove learned the spell of freedom by heart. The shadow of the cage fell across the dove and made its feathers lovelier. The dove stayed. The dove sang. And it set all the doves trembling. 1373

Translator's Notes

The bird does not escape. It sends its shadow out, is given back light, and stays where it is — and the staying is what shakes the other birds.

1994 - ۱۳۷۳ · p. 154

between-explosions

متن اصلی

چرا... عاشق‌تر از عاشقانِ جهان نباشم من که در غم‌انگیزترین خاکِ زمین سبز مانده‌ام... و... در آرزوی خنده‌هایت در فاصلهٔ دو انفجار... آواز خوانده‌ام... در سایهٔ موشک‌ها... بی قایق... بی‌اسب... در آب و بر خاک رانده‌ام... چرا با چهره و دستی گُشاده... سرپا نباشم... چرا عاشق‌تر از عاشقان دنیا نباشم؟... ۱۳۷۳

Machine

Why... should I not be more in love than the lovers of the world — I who, in the most grief-stricken soil on earth, have stayed green... and... longing for your laughter, in the gap between two explosions... have sung... under the shadow of the missiles... with no boat... with no horse... have driven on the water and over the land... Why, with an open face and an open hand... should I not still be standing... Why should I not be more in love than the world's own lovers?... 1373

Lantern

Why should I not be more in love than all the lovers of the world — I who in the most grief-stricken soil on earth have stayed green, and who, wanting your laughter, sang in the gap between two explosions, under the shadow of the missiles, with no boat and no horse drove on over the water and the land? Why, with an open face and an open hand, should I not still be standing? Why should I not be more in love than the world's own lovers?... 1373

1994 - بهار ۱۳۷۳ · p. 155

never-sated

متن اصلی

من از تو سیر نخواهم شد.... کویر از باران... و دشت از آهو... و کوه از تیهو... مُریدِ چشم توام... کف به دَف زَنَم هو... هو... بهار ۱۳۷۳

Machine

I will never have my fill of you.... nor the desert of the rain... nor the plain of the gazelle... nor the mountain of the partridge... I am the disciple of your eyes... Let me strike my palm on the daf — hu... hu... Spring 1373

Lantern

I will never have my fill of you — no more than the desert of rain, or the plain of the gazelle, or the mountain of the partridge. I am the disciple of your eyes. Let me strike my palm on the daf: hu... hu... Spring 1373

Translator's Notes

هو — *Hu*, 'He' — is the syllable of the Sufi dhikr, chanted to the frame drum until the word and the breath are the same thing. The poem arrives there in three lines from a list of thirsts, and the beloved's eyes have become the order the poet has joined.

April 1993 - ۱۳۷۲/۱/۱۶ · p. 156

tree-belief

متن اصلی

من و درخت بر خاک... و... در خاک زمین را دوست داریم و در این کهکشان... همین را دوست داریم. ابر، روح آب است... آب اَبر را نمی‌بیند... باور می‌کند... ابر سطحِ باور را تر می‌کند... ۱۳۷۲/۱/۱۶

Machine

The tree and I — on the earth... and... in the earth, we love the ground, and in all this galaxy... it is just this that we love. The cloud is the soul of the water... The water does not see the cloud... it believes it... The cloud wets the surface of belief... 1372/1/16

Lantern

The tree and I, on the earth and in the earth, love the ground; and in all this galaxy it is just this that we love. The cloud is the soul of the water. The water does not see the cloud — it believes it. The cloud wets the surface of belief... 1372/1/16

Translator's Notes

The water cannot see the cloud it came from and will return to, so its relation to it is belief rather than knowledge. The last line then makes belief a surface that rain can fall on.

June 1994 - ۱۳۷۳/۴/۵ · p. 157

chance-purpose

متن اصلی

عمداً... به اتفاق... از زیرِ ابر گذر کردیم... بارانِ اتفاق از ابرِ عمد بارید... دلی که خاکی‌تر بود... خیس‌تر شد... ۱۳۷۳/۴/۵

Machine

On purpose... by chance... we passed under a cloud... The rain of chance fell out of the cloud of purpose... The heart that was dustier... got the wetter... 1373/4/5

Lantern

On purpose... by chance... we passed beneath a cloud. The rain of chance fell from the cloud of purpose. The heart that was the dustier got the wetter. 1373/4/5

Translator's Notes

عمد and اتفاق — on purpose and by accident — are set side by side in the first line and swapped in the third, so that the deliberate cloud rains an accidental rain. The last line settles it: whichever it was, the outcome went to whoever needed it most.

September 1994 - ۱۳۷۳/۶/۲۲ · p. 158

night-morning

متن اصلی

شب را چگونه صبح خواهم کرد... وقتی تو رفته‌ای... مهتاب مانده است و... مرغ شب ترانهٔ تاریکی را یک ریز خوانده است... ۱۳۷۳/۶/۲۲

Machine

How am I to bring this night to morning... now that you have gone... The moonlight has stayed and... the night bird has sung the song of the dark without stopping once... 1373/6/22

Lantern

How am I to bring this night to morning now that you have gone? The moonlight has stayed, and the night bird has sung the song of the dark without stopping once... 1373/6/22

1994 - آذر ۱۳۷۳ · p. 159

muslin-memory

متن اصلی

پندار خاکم... که مرا... برگ‌های پاییزی پوشانده... پیش از این که تن به دریا بسپاری، در من غلطی بزن... تا عطر پنجاه و پنج بهار، بر پیکرت بنشیند... آنک... تو را... در ململی از خاطره می‌پیچم... تو را، که... به دورترین جزیرهٔ جهان سفر خواهی کرد... انگار خاکم... ای یار... صندوقچه‌ای از مرا... همراه بردار. آذر ۱۳۷۳

Machine

Think of me as earth... earth that... the autumn leaves have covered over... Before you give your body to the sea, take one roll in me... so the scent of fifty-five springs settles on your body... There... I wrap you... in a muslin of memory... you, who... will travel to the furthest island in the world... Imagine I am earth... O love... take a small casket of me... along with you. Azar 1373

Lantern

Think of me as earth — earth the autumn leaves have covered over. Before you give your body to the sea, take one roll in me, so the scent of fifty-five springs settles on your body. There — I wrap you in a muslin of memory, you who will travel to the furthest island in the world. Imagine I am earth. O love, take a small casket of me along with you. Azar 1373

Translator's Notes

Fifty-five springs is the poet's own age, and the only place in the book where he counts it exactly: it puts his birth in ۱۳۱۸, 1939. Elsewhere he says 'sixty years' four times across sixteen years, which is a way of saying *all my life* rather than a number.

1995 - ۱۳۷۴ · p. 160

shell-sleep

متن اصلی

خواب... دریای... مه آلودِ... معطر، و تو با، زورقِ ابر هر شب از ساحل مهر، در کنارم به سفر می‌آیی... من و تو در صدفی می‌خوابیم... عمقِ آبی... دلِ سرخ... و نَفَس‌های بنفش... موج‌هایی می‌برد ما را... تا دور... تُو به تُو... دم در دم پشتِ تاریکی‌ها... تا نور... نه هراسِ ماندن... نه شتابِ رفتن... خواب دریای دل آرامِ صبور. موج‌ها با هم در کار... چشم‌ها بسته و دل بیدار... من و تو در صدفی می‌خوابیم... ساق در ساقی تر... مثل دو نیلوفر... تا سرِ شاخ سحر می‌تابیم... «خوابَ رؤیای فراموشی‌هاست»* خواب را دریابیم... ۱۳۷۴

Machine

Sleep... a sea... mist-laden... perfumed, and you, in a skiff of cloud, each night from the shore of kindness, come travelling beside me... You and I sleep inside a shell... blue depth... red heart... and violet breathing... Waves are carrying us... far out... fold within fold... breath within breath... behind the darknesses... to the light... No dread of staying... no hurry to be gone... Sleep, the sea of the calm and patient heart. The waves at work together... eyes shut and the heart awake... You and I sleep inside a shell... stalk wound in wetter stalk... like two water lilies... we shine out to the very tip of dawn's branch... "Sleep is the dream of all the forgettings"* Let us take hold of sleep... 1374

Lantern

Sleep — a sea, mist-laden, perfumed, and you in a skiff of cloud come travelling to my side each night from the shore of kindness. You and I sleep inside a shell: blue depth, red heart, and violet breathing. Waves are carrying us far out, fold within fold, breath within breath, behind the darknesses, toward the light. No dread of staying, no hurry to be gone. Sleep, the sea of the calm and patient heart. The waves at work together, eyes shut and the heart awake. You and I sleep inside a shell, stalk wound in wetter stalk, like two water lilies, and we shine to the very tip of dawn's branch... "Sleep is the dream of all the forgettings" Let us take hold of sleep... 1374

Translator's Notes

The line in quotation marks is not Jafari's. The printed page carries an asterisk and answers it under the frame: **حمید مصدق** — Hamid Mosaddegh (1939-1998), the poet to whom this poem is dedicated, and an exact contemporary. Jafari ends his own poem on a borrowed line and signs it to its owner. The phrase تُو به تُو, *fold within fold*, is printed here with its vowels marked. That matters beyond this poem: the title poem on page 72 reads در دیوارهای توبه تو, which has always looked like a typesetter's run-together of the same phrase, and this page shows the poet using it plainly.

April 1995 - ۱۳۷۴/۱/۲۲ · p. 161

moonlit-glass

متن اصلی

آه امشب... باز می‌نوشم... هدیه سهراب را... آب در لیوانِ پرمهتاب را. ابرِ سنگینی‌ست دم‌کرده هوا اینجا... تو کجایی تا بنوشانم به تو... هدیه سهراب را... آب در لیوانِ پرمهتاب را... ۱۳۷۴/۱/۲۲

Machine

Ah, tonight... again I am drinking... Sohrab's gift... the water in the moon-filled glass. There is a heavy cloud, the air in here is close... Where are you, that I might give you to drink... Sohrab's gift... the water in the moon-filled glass... 1374/1/22

Lantern

Ah, tonight I am drinking it again — Sohrab's gift, the water in the moon-filled glass. There is a heavy cloud; the air in here is close. Where are you, that I might give you to drink Sohrab's gift, the water in the moon-filled glass... 1374/1/22

Translator's Notes

Sohrab Sepehri's most quoted line in Persian is *let us not muddy the water* — آب را گل نکنیم. What is handed round here as his gift is a glass of clean water with the moon in it.

August 1995 - ۱۳۷۴/۵/۲۷ · p. 162

old-door

متن اصلی

من پشتِ درِ پیری پا به پا می‌کنم... با آن‌که در باز است به دنبال کلید می‌گردم... آسمان بارانی‌ست و من در جوانی باران را دوست داشته‌ام... اگر در پیری باران را دوست داشته باشم... جوان خواهم شد؟... تو را که همسایهٔ بارانی دوست خواهم داشت؟... ۱۳۷۴/۵/۲۷

Machine

At the door of old age I shift from foot to foot... Though the door stands open I keep hunting for the key... The sky is full of rain and in my youth I loved the rain... If in old age I love the rain... shall I grow young?... And you, who are the rain's neighbour — shall I love you?... 1374/5/27

Lantern

At the door of old age I shift from foot to foot. Though the door stands open I keep hunting for the key. The sky is full of rain, and in my youth I loved the rain. If in old age I love the rain, will I grow young? And you, who are the rain's neighbour — will I love you? 1374/5/27

آزادی پشتِ درهای بسته...

Freedom Behind Closed Doors

February 1996 - ۱۳۷۴/۱۱/۲۴ · p. 163

freedom-doors

متن اصلی

آزادی پشتِ دری بسته... از روزنهٔ یک بوسه... مرا به باغی برد... که بارانش، گل‌های یاس بودند. در سایهٔ درختانِ بیدمجنون، کودکی‌ام را دیدم... که با شصت سالگی‌ام... آب‌بازی می‌کرد... ۱۳۷۴/۱۱/۲۴

Machine

Freedom, behind a shut door... through the chink of a single kiss... carried me off to a garden whose rain was jasmine flowers. In the shade of the weeping willows I saw my childhood... splashing in the water... with my sixtieth year... 1374/11/24

Lantern

Freedom, behind a shut door, through the chink of a single kiss, carried me off to a garden whose rain was jasmine flowers. And in the shade of the weeping willows I saw my childhood splashing in the water with my sixtieth year... 1374/11/24

1996 - ۱۳۷۵ · p. 164

barbat-gazelle

متن اصلی

می‌شود تو را... مثل بَرَبَطی نواخت... مثلِ تیهوئی شنید... مثل آهویی شناخت... در کدام آسمان پرواز... در کدامین رود شنا می‌کنی... ۱۳۷۵

Machine

You can be... played like a barbat... heard like a partridge... known like a gazelle... In which sky do you fly... in which river do you swim... 1375

Lantern

You can be played like a barbat, heard like a partridge, known like a gazelle. In which sky do you fly? In which river do you swim? 1375

1996 - تهران، خرداد ۱۳۷۵ · p. 165-166

coloured-stones

متن اصلی

مهر مردِ مهربان مُهرِ خامُشی به لب نهاد، مثلِ سنگ‌های رنگی‌اش، صبور شد باغبان باغ‌های نور شد... پیرمرد... قطره‌های جام را تهی سرکشید... و گفت: در هوای اتفاقِ سرخ شاد باشم به از آن که در کویرِ کور زنده یاد باشم. ...دور از وطن... سال‌ها گذشت... بینِ ما... هر شبی که قرص مَه تمام بود گفتگوی بی‌کلام بود... پیرمرد... مثل گل میانِ سنگ، بی‌درنگ... در هوای سرخِ درد ریشه کرد... ریشه‌های درد استخوان به استخوان... مثل باغ... در زمین زبرِ پیکَرش نشست... پیرمرد... ساکت و صبور و... سرد لب به ساغر تُهی نهاد و گفت... در هوای اتفاقِ سرخ شاد باشم به از آن که در کویرِ کور زنده‌یاد باشم... باغ درد... شاد شد... پیرمرد... زنده یاد شد... مهر مردِ مهربانِ شاد مهرِ خامشی زِ لب گشود بر نفس نهاد... تهران، خرداد ۱۳۷۵

Machine

The kindness of the kind man laid the seal of silence on his lip; like his coloured stones, he turned patient, he became the gardener of the gardens of light... The old man... drained the last drops of the cup... and said: better to be glad in the air of the red chance than, out in the blind desert, to be "of blessed memory." ...far from home... the years went by... Between us... on every night the moon's disc was full there was a conversation without words... The old man... like a flower among stones, without pausing... took root in the red air of pain... The roots of pain, bone upon bone... like a garden... settled into the rough ground of his body... The old man... silent and patient and... cold, set his lip to the empty goblet and said... better to be glad in the air of the red chance than, out in the blind desert, to be "of blessed memory"... The garden of pain... turned glad... The old man... became "of blessed memory"... The kindness of the kind and glad man loosed the seal of silence from his lip and laid it on his breath... Tehran, Khordad 1375

Lantern

The kindness of the kind man laid the seal of silence on his lip. Like his coloured stones he turned patient; he became the gardener of the gardens of light. The old man drained the last drops of the cup and said: better to be glad in the air of the red chance than, out in the blind desert, to be "of blessed memory." ...far from home... the years went by... Between us, on every night the moon's disc was full, there was a conversation without words. The old man, like a flower among stones, took root at once in the red air of pain. The roots of pain, bone upon bone, like a garden, settled into the rough ground of his body. The old man — silent, patient, and cold — set his lip to the empty goblet and said: better to be glad in the air of the red chance than, out in the blind desert, to be "of blessed memory." The garden of pain turned glad. The old man became "of blessed memory." The kindness of the kind and glad man loosed the seal of silence from his lip and laid it on his breath... Tehran, Khordad 1375

Translator's Notes

زنده‌یاد means, word for word, *living memory*, and is what Persian calls someone who has died — the equivalent of 'the late'. The painter in this poem says twice that he would rather be glad than be زنده یاد, and the poem's last movement grants him the thing he refused. English has no honorific with a literal meaning that pleasant, so it is kept in quotation marks here. The opening two lines also rhyme on a pun that cannot cross: مهر is kindness or love, مُهر is a seal, and they are written with the same letters. The kindness of the kind man is what seals his mouth.

1996 - تابستان ۱۳۷۵ · p. 167

wet-cheeks

متن اصلی

آنقدر ماندم... آنقدر شعر گفتم... آنقدر شعر خواندم... گونه‌هایت تر شد... گریه‌ات... در باران... باور شد... تابستان ۱۳۷۵

Machine

I stayed so long... I made so many poems... I read so many poems... that your cheeks went wet... and your weeping... in the rain... became belief... Summer 1375

Lantern

I stayed so long, made so many poems, read so many poems, that your cheeks went wet and your weeping, in the rain, became belief... Summer 1375

July 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۴/۱۱ · p. 168

no-time

متن اصلی

کوچک‌ترین پرنده به من آموخت... دوست داشتن وقت نمی‌خواهد... من و تو... هیچ وقت نداریم... و... همیشه با همیم... ۱۳۷۵/۴/۱۱

Machine

The smallest bird taught me... loving does not ask for time... You and I... have no time at all... and... we are together always... 1375/4/11

Lantern

The smallest bird taught me that loving does not ask for time. You and I have no time at all — and we are together always... 1375/4/11

Translator's Notes

هیچ وقت نداریم means both *we have no time* and *we never do*, and the poem needs both at once: the lovers are given nothing and it turns out to be enough.

1996 - شهریور ۱۳۷۵ · p. 169-170

friends-cloud

متن اصلی

ای منِ محزون... دوستانِ عاشقِ سرگشتهٔ تو مثلِ دریایی... بعدِ رفتن... ابرشان بر جای می‌ماند... ابر... دریای مسافر... بحرِ هجرانی... روح پر شورِ... کویرِ... مستِ... بارانی... پاکِ... غمناکِ... غریبِ... دشتِ حیرانی... دودِ آه آهوان... این تشنه کامانِ بیابانی. دوستانِ عاشقِ من بعدِ رفتن... مثلِ دریا... ابرشان برجای می‌ماند.... ابر عاشق... هر کجا که پاک و غمناک است می‌بارد... ابر جانی تازه و روحی کهن دارد ابر هر جا... ابر هر دَم... قسمت خاک است می‌بارد. ابر با جادوی غم... در جانِ جنگل جای می‌گیرد... و قناری پای هر برگی... بی‌خبر از هیبت بی‌سایهٔ مرگی... تا نفس باقی‌ست... آخرین خطِ کجِ سیم قفس باقی‌ست می‌خواند... من ندانستم... شاید این سرگشته عاشق هم نمی‌داند... بی‌صدا... بی‌همهمه... بی‌داد... با قلم... با تیشه و اندیشهٔ فرهاد... عشق در جانِ جهان... جاوید می‌ماند... شهریور ۱۳۷۵

Machine

O my sorrowing self... Your wandering friends, the lovers, are like a sea... after the going... their cloud stays behind... Cloud... the travelling sea... the ocean of separation... the ardent soul... of the desert... drunk... rain-heavy... pure... grieving... a stranger... the plain of bewilderment... the smoke of the gazelles' sighing... these parched-mouthed ones of the wilderness. My friends, the lovers, after the going... like the sea... their cloud stays behind.... The cloud in love... rains wherever it is pure and grieving... The cloud has a fresh life and an ancient soul. The cloud everywhere... the cloud every moment... it is the earth's portion, it rains. The cloud, with the magic of grief... settles into the soul of the forest... and a canary, at the foot of every leaf... knowing nothing of the shadowless dread of a death... sings while the breath is left... while the last crooked line of the cage-wire is left... I did not know... Perhaps this wandering lover does not know either... Soundless... without a murmur... without a cry... With the pen... with the adze and the mind of Farhad... love, in the soul of the world... stays for ever... Shahrivar 1375

Lantern

O my sorrowing self — your wandering friends, the lovers, are like a sea: after the going, their cloud stays behind. Cloud — the travelling sea, the ocean of separation, the ardent soul of the desert, drunk, rain-heavy, pure, grieving, a stranger, the plain of bewilderment, the smoke of the gazelles' sighing, these parched-mouthed ones of the wilderness. My friends, the lovers, after the going, like the sea, their cloud stays behind. The cloud in love rains wherever it is pure and grieving. The cloud has a fresh life and an ancient soul. The cloud everywhere, the cloud every moment — it is the earth's portion, and it rains. The cloud, with the magic of grief, settles into the soul of the forest, and a canary at the foot of every leaf, knowing nothing of the shadowless dread of a death, sings while the breath is left to it, while the last crooked line of the cage-wire is left. I did not know. Perhaps this wandering lover does not know either. Soundless, without a murmur, without a cry — with the pen, with the adze and the mind of Farhad, love, in the soul of the world, stays for ever. Shahrivar 1375

Translator's Notes

Farhad is the stonecutter of *Khosrow and Shirin*, who was set to carve a road through Mount Bisotun for love of Shirin and did it. The poem's last claim is that the pen and the adze do the same work, and that this is the only thing that lasts.

September 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۶/۲۲ · p. 171

no-wall

متن اصلی

دوست دارم با تو باشم... بی‌خبر از هرچه دیوار است... هیچ‌کس از ما نپرسد... کِی... کُجا... دیوار در کار است... گاه پنهان از نگاهِ ماه... غرق در بوی گیاهی تلخ... در پناهی... بافته از پشم و ابریشم... گاه با هم در خَمِ یک راه... مست و تر از بارشِ نم نم... من همیشه تشنه باشم... تو گیاهی خیس در شبنم... ۱۳۷۵/۶/۲۲

Machine

I want to be with you... knowing nothing of whatever wall there is... Let nobody ask us... when... where... a wall is at work... Sometimes hidden from the moon's gaze... steeped in the smell of a bitter herb... in a shelter... woven of wool and silk... Sometimes together in the bend of one road... drunk and level with the drizzling rain... Let me be always thirsty... and you a plant wet with dew... 1375/6/22

Lantern

I want to be with you knowing nothing of whatever wall there is. Let nobody ask us when, or where, a wall is at work. Sometimes hidden from the moon's looking, steeped in the smell of a bitter herb, in a shelter woven of wool and silk; sometimes together in the bend of one road, drunk and wet from the drizzle. Let me be always thirsty, and you a plant wet with dew... 1375/6/22

November 1996 - ۱۳۷۵/۸/۱۷ · p. 173

open-lips

متن اصلی

لب باز کن... با نگاه به این سنگ، بَراین کتیبهٔ همیشه دلتنگ... لب باز کن... با نگاه به این گل... یا با نگاه به سبزه... اینک کنارِ تو... ترکیبِ سبز و خاک و... خطّ و خاطره... کاری بکن که هیچ نکردی... راهی برو که هیچ نرفتی... شعری بخوان... نگفته... نخوانده... لب باز کن... چیزی بگو که هیچ نگفتی... این‌بار در هُرمِ هاله... هالهٔ دیدار... روح مرا رها کن... از خمودیِ تکرار یک جمله... یک پدیدهٔ تازه... بی‌مبتدا... بی‌قید... بی‌خبر... با قلب سرخ... اما... و با نگاهِ تر ای آهِ من... دعای مرا مستجاب کن... هرکس که آفرید... گناهش ثواب کن ۱۳۷۵/۸/۱۷

Machine

Open your lips... with a look at this stone, at this inscription that is always grieving... Open your lips... with a look at this flower... or with a look at the grass... Here now, beside you... a compound of green and earth and... line and memory... Do a thing you have never done... Go a road you have never gone... Sing a poem... unsaid... unsung... Open your lips... Say a thing you have never said... This time in the shimmer of a halo... the halo of meeting... Let my soul go... out of the torpor of repetition... One sentence... one new-made thing... no subject... no adverb... no predicate... with a red heart... and yet... and with a wet gaze... O my own sigh... grant my prayer... and whoever made it... count his sin a merit. 1375/8/17

Lantern

Open your lips — with a look at this stone, at this inscription that is always grieving. Open your lips — with a look at this flower, or with a look at the grass. Here now, beside you: a compound of green and earth, of line and memory. Do a thing you have never done. Go a road you have never gone. Sing a poem unsaid, unsung. Open your lips. Say a thing you have never said. This time, in the shimmer of a halo, the halo of meeting, let my soul go out of the torpor of repetition — one sentence, one new-made thing, with no subject, no adverb, no predicate, with a red heart, and yet, and with a wet looking. O my own sigh — grant my prayer, and whoever made it, count his sin a merit. 1375/8/17

Translator's Notes

بی‌مبتدا، بی‌قید، بی‌خبر names the three parts of a Persian sentence — subject, adverb, predicate — and asks for an utterance with none of them. The last of the three, بی‌خبر, is also the everyday word for *unaware*, so the line simultaneously asks for a sentence with no grammar and for a state with no knowledge. The English keeps the grammar and loses the innocence.

February 1997 - تهران ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۳ · p. 174

turquoise-mirror

متن اصلی

برخیزم فابوس ماه را در آینه بیاویزم و آنقدر نام تو را در پرده‌های اشک بخوانم تا سطح آینه چهل تکه‌ای از... آه... و... آبی... و... فیروزه‌ای شود... آنگاه... تو... از زمین سفر کرده... آن صبح سرد آفتابی... در حسرت هزار نگاه... سرد و سپید و پاک در دست‌های باد در پله‌های خاک شاید به راه بیایی در پرده... با کجاوهٔ لیلی از راه ماه بیایی... تهران ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۳

Machine

Let me rise and hang the lantern of the moon in the mirror, and say your name so many times through the curtains of tears that the mirror's surface turns a forty-piece patchwork of... sighs... and... blue... and... turquoise... And then... you... who have travelled out of the earth... that cold sunlit morning... in the longing of a thousand gazes... cold and white and pure, in the hands of the wind, on the stairs of dust — perhaps you will come along the road, behind the curtain... with Layla's litter, and come by way of the moon... Tehran 1375/11/23

Lantern

Let me rise and hang the lantern of the moon in the mirror, and say your name so many times through the curtains of tears that the mirror's surface turns a forty-piece patchwork of sighs, and blue, and turquoise. And then — you, who have travelled out of the earth that cold sunlit morning, missed by a thousand looks, cold and white and pure, in the hands of the wind, on the stairs of dust — perhaps you will come along the road, behind the curtain, with Layla's litter, and come by way of the moon... Tehran 1375/11/23

Translator's Notes

فیروزه is a woman's name and also the word for turquoise. The poem says the name over and over into a mirror until the glass changes colour, and the colour it arrives at is her name. An elegy that ends by spelling the dead woman out of the thing it is looking into. Line 2 is printed as فابوس, which is not a Persian word. It is almost certainly فانوس — *lantern* — a single dot away, and the line makes sense no other way. The printed reading is kept in the Persian above; the English takes the lantern.

February 1997 - ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۶ · p. 175

well-doves

متن اصلی

ما نرفتیم... دوام آوردیم... تا کبوترها را... از دلِ چاه... به بام آوردیم... ۱۳۷۵/۱۱/۲۶

Machine

We did not go... we held out... until the doves... from the heart of the well... we brought up to the roof... 1375/11/26

Lantern

we didn't go we brought persistance to pigeons from the hearts of wells to the roof tops we bring it in

April 1997 - ۱۳۷۶/۱/۲۱ · p. 176

empty-house

متن اصلی

خانه خلوت شد... پر شد از بوی فراغ... یک نفر از ما... به آن سوی قفس رفته‌ست... سایه‌اش... از دور... آفتابی در نگاه ماست... یک نفر که مثلِ باران، در بهارِ کشتگاه ماست... و... به سرمایِ زمستانی که... پیشاپیش راهِ ماست... ۱۳۷۶/۱/۲۱

Machine

The house went quiet... It filled with the smell of parting... One of us... has gone to the far side of the cage... Her shadow... from a distance... is a sunlight in our eyes... One who, like the rain, is in the spring of our sown field... and... against the winter cold that... lies on the road ahead of us... 1376/1/21

Lantern

The house went quiet. It filled with the smell of parting. One of us has gone to the far side of the cage. Her shadow, from a distance, is a sunlight in our eyes — one who, like the rain, is in the spring of our sown field, and against the winter cold that lies on the road ahead of us... 1376/1/21

Translator's Notes

The daughter's name is Sayeh, which is the Persian for *shadow*. So the line that says her shadow reaches them from far off is also saying her name, and the poem can call a departure a source of light without straining. English has to pick one of the two.

July 1997 - ۱۳۷۶/۵/۷ · p. 177

every-look

متن اصلی

در هر نگاه... یک وصل... یک هجران... در هر نگاه... یک تبسّم... یک آه... ۱۳۷۶/۵/۷

Machine

In every look... one meeting... one parting... In every look... one smile... one sigh... 1376/5/7

Lantern

In every look, one meeting and one parting. In every look, one smile and one sigh. 1376/5/7

March 1998 - ۱۳۷۶/۱۲/۲۸ · p. 178

new-year

متن اصلی

شوقِ یک قطرهٔ باران به چمن، شور یک بوسهٔ تو بر لبِ من، مهربانی... ماه... باران... و بهار... و همین... سالِ نو یعنی این... ۱۳۷۶/۱۲/۲۸

Machine

The longing of one raindrop toward the grass, the thrill of one kiss of yours on my lip, kindness... the moon... rain... and spring... and just this... The new year means this... 1376/12/28

Lantern

The longing of one raindrop toward the grass, the thrill of one kiss of yours on my lip, kindness, the moon, rain, and spring — just this. The new year means this. 1376/12/28

1998 - تهران ۱۳۷۷ · p. 179

destination-going

متن اصلی

در سفر هرکس به مقصد می‌رسد می‌ایستد... من سفر را دوست دارم مقصد من... رفتن است... تهران ۱۳۷۷

Machine

On a journey everyone reaches a destination and stops... I love the journey — my destination... is the going... Tehran 1377

Lantern

in traveling... everyone arrives at a destination... stops, stays... I quite like travelling... my destination... is the going...

1999 - ۱۳۷۸ · p. 180

murmur-ear

متن اصلی

گوشِ من زمزمه‌ای می‌شنود... تو لبانت خاموش... تو نگاهت هوسِ باران را... روی برگِ تشنه می‌بیند... تو... نگاهت در من آتش افروخت... هَوسِ بوسه... لبانم را سوخت... ۱۳۷۸

Machine

My ear is hearing a murmur... and your lips are silent... Your gaze sees the rain's craving... on the thirsty leaf... You... your gaze lit a fire in me... the craving for a kiss... burned my lips... 1378

Lantern

My ear is hearing a murmur and your lips are silent. Your looking sees the rain's craving on the thirsty leaf. You — your looking lit a fire in me, and the craving for a kiss burned my lips... 1378

2000 - تهران ۱۳۷۹ · p. 181

unsung-songs

متن اصلی

عاشق ساز آواز بودم پدرم گفت حرام است. شصت سال آوازهای نخوانده‌ام را خواب و بیدار خط خطی کردم بی آن که خطی به دیوار جهان کشیده باشم... تهران ۱۳۷۹

Machine

I was in love with the instrument, with song. My father said: it is forbidden. For sixty years the songs I never sang sleeping and waking I have scribbled over without ever having drawn one line on the wall of the world... Tehran 1379

Lantern

I was in love with the instrument, with song. My father said: it is forbidden. For sixty years I have scribbled over the songs I never sang, sleeping and waking, without ever having drawn one line on the wall of the world... Tehran 1379

Translator's Notes

The Persian sets خط خطی کردن — to scribble out, to cross through — against کشیدن خطی, to draw a single line. The same word does the cancelling and the making, so sixty years of crossing out amount to not having made one mark. English has to use two different words and loses the knot.

2001 - فروردین ۱۳۸۰ · p. 183

childhood-road

متن اصلی

شصت سال از کودکی‌ام دور شده‌ام در آرزوی رسیدن هرچه دوست داشتم را جا گذاشتم... برگردم... شاید نگاه مادر نی‌لبک تیروکمان و تابم را در راه بیابم. فروردین ۱۳۸۰

Machine

Sixty years I have been going away from my childhood in the longing to arrive. Everything I loved, I left behind... Let me turn back... Perhaps my mother's look, the reed pipe, the bow and arrow, and my swing — I will find them along the road. Farvardin 1380

Lantern

Sixty years I have been going away from my childhood in the longing to arrive. Everything I loved, I left behind. Let me turn back. Perhaps my mother's look, the reed pipe, the bow and arrow, and my swing — perhaps I will find them along the road. Farvardin 1380

Translator's Notes

The bow and arrow are the ones from the proverb the poet made up ten years earlier, in the poem he sent to *Gardoon* magazine: *once they have taken your rifle, the bow and arrow of your childhood does not miss.* Here he is walking back to look for them.

May 2001 - ۱۳۸۰/۲/۲۶ · p. 184-185

mother-tenderness

متن اصلی

تا یاد دارمش... در هاله‌ای از عاطفه می‌لغزید. بر گونه‌های مادر... از برگ‌های عاطفه باغی بود... از رنگ‌های عاطفه گلزاری... مویش سیاه بود... و سال‌های بعد... دودی شد... از دود بید و شاخهٔ انگور... در شعله‌ها و ساقه‌های گندم و خشخاش... که شعله می‌شدند... در زیر دیگ آش. همیشه چشم‌هاش... پُر بود از نگاهی امیدوار... و در متن انتظارش... موسیقی دعا جریان داشت... و سطح ندبه‌اش... دیوار مطبخی... که از سیاهی برق می‌زد. با یادِ مادر... من هرچه نذر کردم... شد... و هرچه کاشتم رویید... و... گل کرد و میوه داد. بر گونه‌های مادر... از برگ‌های عاطفه باغی بود... از رنگ‌های عاطفه گلزاری... دیشب تبی نیامده... تابش برد.... مادر به راه این سفرِ جاوید... بربال‌های عاطفه* خوابش برد... ۱۳۸۰/۲/۲۶

Machine

For as long as I can remember her... she moved in a halo of tenderness. On my mother's cheeks... there was a garden made of the leaves of tenderness... a flower-bed made of the colours of tenderness... Her hair was black... and in the years after... it turned smoke-coloured... from the smoke of willow and vine-branch... in the flames, and the stalks of wheat and poppy... that became flame... under the soup pot. Her eyes were always... full of a hopeful looking... and through the whole text of her waiting... the music of prayer was running... and the surface of her lamenting... a kitchen wall... that shone black with soot. Remembering my mother... whatever I vowed... came about... and whatever I planted grew... and... flowered and bore fruit. On my mother's cheeks... there was a garden made of the leaves of tenderness... a flower-bed made of the colours of tenderness... Last night a fever that had not even arrived... carried her strength away.... Mother, on the road of this everlasting journey... fell asleep on the wings of Atefeh*... 1380/2/26

Lantern

For as long as I can remember her she moved in a halo of tenderness. On my mother's cheeks there was a garden made of the leaves of tenderness, a flower-bed made of the colours of tenderness. Her hair was black, and in the years after it turned the colour of smoke — smoke of willow and vine-branch in the flames, and stalks of wheat and poppy that became flame under the soup pot. Her eyes were always full of a hopeful looking, and through the whole text of her waiting the music of prayer was running, and the surface of her lamenting was a kitchen wall that shone black with soot. Remembering my mother: whatever I vowed came about, and whatever I planted grew, and flowered, and bore fruit. On my mother's cheeks there was a garden made of the leaves of tenderness, a flower-bed made of the colours of tenderness. Last night a fever that had not even arrived carried her strength away. Mother, on the road of this everlasting journey, fell asleep on the wings of Atefeh... 1380/2/26

Translator's Notes

عاطفه — *Atefeh* — is the word for tenderness, affection, the thing the whole poem has been describing on the mother's face. The printed page carries an asterisk on its last use of the word and answers it beneath the frame: > عاطفه نام پرستار مهربان مادر — *Atefeh is the name of mother's kind nurse.* So the last line means both that she fell asleep on the wings of tenderness and that she died in the arms of a woman called Tenderness, and the poem does not tell you until it is over. English can keep the name or the meaning, not both at once.

November 2002 - ۱۳۸۱/۹/۷ · p. 186

rain-cypress

متن اصلی

و از آن پس... باران مشتاقی بودم... که... بر پیکر سروی بی‌تاب می‌بارید... سرو را می‌شست و... به امّیدِ بار دیگر... که... به آسمان برگردد... و... باران شَود... با بوی سرو به دریا می‌رفت. آنک صدای دعای زنی‌ست... «آه ای خورشید روزهای روشن، از تبارِ پرندگان دریایی... تندتر بتاب تا موج‌های بی‌قرار... ابر شوند... و... بر تمامی کویرهای زمینی... سبزه برویید...» و از آن پس... بارانِ پُر از ترانه‌ای بودم... که بر پیکرِ بی‌تابِ سروهایِ جهان می‌بارید... سرو را می‌شست... و از پای سرو به بستر رود می‌رفت... رود که... دیوانهٔ دریا بود... که خوب و زیبا بود... ۱۳۸۱/۹/۷

Machine

And after that... I was an eager rain... that... fell on the body of a restless cypress... It washed the cypress and... hoping for one more turn... that... it might climb back to the sky... and... become rain... it went down to the sea with the scent of cypress on it. And there is the sound of a woman praying... "Ah, sun of the bright days, of the lineage of the sea-birds... burn harder, so that the restless waves... turn to cloud... and... over every desert of the earth... green things grow..." And after that... I was a rain brim-full of a song... that fell on the restless body of the cypresses of the world... It washed the cypress... and from the cypress's foot went down to the river's bed... the river that... was mad for the sea... that was good, and beautiful... 1381/9/7

Lantern

And after that I was an eager rain falling on the body of a restless cypress. It washed the cypress and, hoping for one more turn — that it might climb back to the sky and become rain — went down to the sea with the scent of cypress on it. And there is the sound of a woman praying: "Ah, sun of the bright days, of the lineage of the sea-birds, burn harder, so that the restless waves turn to cloud, and over every desert of the earth green things grow..." And after that I was a rain brim-full of a song falling on the restless body of the cypresses of the world. It washed the cypress and from the cypress's foot went down to the river's bed — the river that was mad for the sea, that was good, and beautiful... 1381/9/7

2003 - ۱۳۸۲ · p. 187

flickering-star

متن اصلی

شوقِ ستاره‌ای که... سُو... سُو می‌زند... مرا از تاریکی می‌رهاند... ۱۳۸۲

Machine

The longing of a star that... flickers... flickers... delivers me out of the darkness... 1382

Lantern

The longing of a star that flickers, flickers, delivers me out of the darkness... 1382

2003 - تهران ۱۳۸۲ · p. 188

free-song

متن اصلی

بگوشم نور صبح حنجرت تابید و بیداری سبزی گوش‌هایم را نوازش داد نمیدانم که بوی ابر می‌آید و یا غم در دلم شاد است. صدایی مهربان داری که با مهتاب همراه است بخوان تا انتظار خاک تر گردد سفر کردست بی‌مهتاب. بخوان آغوش واکرده که با مهتاب برگردد. خیالت از سفر آمد و روی سایه‌ها خوابید بگوشم نور صبح حنجرت تابید. نمی‌دانم که بوی ابر می‌آید و یا غم در دلم شاد است. صدایی مهربان داری که با مهتاب همزاد است صدا از ماه می‌آید بخوان آواز آزاد است. تهران ۱۳۸۲

Machine

The morning light of your throat shone into my ear and a green wakefulness stroked my ears. I cannot tell whether the smell of cloud is coming or whether the grief in my heart is glad. You have a kind voice that keeps company with the moonlight — sing, until the earth's waiting turns wet. It has gone travelling with no moonlight on it. Sing — it has opened its arms to come back with the moonlight. Your image came home from the journey and lay down to sleep on the shadows. The morning light of your throat shone into my ear. I cannot tell whether the smell of cloud is coming or whether the grief in my heart is glad. You have a kind voice that is the moonlight's twin. The sound is coming from the moon — sing: the song is free. Tehran 1382

Lantern

The morning light of your throat shone into my ear and a green wakefulness stroked my hearing. I cannot tell whether the smell of cloud is coming or whether the grief in my heart is glad. You have a kind voice that keeps company with the moonlight — sing, until the earth's waiting turns wet. It has gone travelling with no moonlight on it. Sing. It has opened its arms to come back with the moonlight. Your image came home from the journey and lay down to sleep on the shadows. The morning light of your throat shone into my ear. I cannot tell whether the smell of cloud is coming or whether the grief in my heart is glad. You have a kind voice that is the moonlight's twin. The sound is coming from the moon. Sing: the song is free. Tehran 1382

February 2004 - ۱۳۸۲/۱۱/۱۵ · p. 189

be-willow

متن اصلی

بید باش... میخواهم چون جویبار در پای تو زمزمه کنم... سبز بمان تا همهٔ خواب‌های زمستانی‌ام را در ریشه‌های بهاری تو تعبیر کنم... بر تو می‌وَزَم... آنسان که نسیم بی‌قرار می‌وَزَد... بید باش... من باد نیستم که تو را بلرزانم... من آن آتشم که چوپانی عاشق روشن می‌کند.... بید باش... تا برّه‌های خیالم... در سایهٔ تو بخواب روند... سبز بمان... تا خواب‌های زمستانیم را... در بهار تو تعبیر کنم... ۱۳۸۲/۱۱/۱۵

Machine

Be a willow... I want, like a brook, to murmur at your feet... Stay green so that all my winter dreams I may read out in your spring roots... I blow upon you... the way the restless breeze blows... Be a willow... I am not the wind, to set you shaking... I am that fire a shepherd in love kindles.... Be a willow... so the lambs of my imagining... may go to sleep in your shade... Stay green... so that my winter dreams... I may read out in your spring... 1382/11/15

Lantern

Be a willow. I want to murmur at your feet like a brook. Stay green, so that all my winter dreams I may read out in your spring roots. I blow upon you the way the restless breeze blows. Be a willow. I am not the wind, to set you shaking. I am that fire a shepherd in love kindles. Be a willow, so the lambs of my imagining may go to sleep in your shade. Stay green, so that my winter dreams I may read out in your spring... 1382/11/15

Translator's Notes

تعبیر is the word for interpreting a dream, and it governs both times the poem asks the willow to stay green. The winter dreams are not to be endured until spring; spring is the thing that will explain them.

2004 - تهران ۱۳۸۳ · p. 190

desert-thirst

متن اصلی

شصت سال گذشت شبی باران بر کویر بارید. کویر هرچه می‌خواست آن شد. کویر تشنه باران شد... تهران ۱۳۸۳

Machine

Sixty years went by. One night the rain fell on the desert. The desert became whatever it had wanted. The desert became thirsty for rain... Tehran 1383

Lantern

Sixty years went by. One night the rain fell on the desert. The desert became whatever it had wanted. The desert became thirsty for rain... Tehran 1383

Translator's Notes

The desert is granted its wish and the wish turns out to be the thirst itself, not the water. Which makes the sixty years in the first line a description of the same arrangement.

2004 - ۱۳۸۳ · p. 191

water-thread

متن اصلی

گناه از نَخِ آب بود که شوقِ مرا... بر پیکر تو گره زد... خواب‌هایم آشفته تر از آنست که... باران را از دوشِ آب تمیز دهم... با نخ‌های تابیدهٔ آب... بر تو بسته شدم... و چشم‌های تَرَم... در حسرت بوسه خشک شد... ای ابر خوب... درهوای من ببار و خاک مرا تر کن تو... بر من ببار... گرهٔ آب را... خاک باز می‌کند... ۱۳۸۳

Machine

The fault lay with the thread of water that knotted my longing... onto your body... My dreams are too tangled for me... to tell the rain from the shower of water... With the twisted threads of water... I was bound onto you... and my wet eyes... went dry with longing for a kiss... O good cloud... rain into my air and wet my earth, you... rain down on me... The knot of water... the earth unties... 1383

Lantern

The fault lay with the thread of the water that knotted my longing onto your body. My dreams are too tangled for me to tell the rain from the shower of water. With the twisted threads of water I was bound onto you, and my wet eyes went dry with longing for a kiss. O good cloud — rain into my air and wet my earth. You — rain down on me. The knot of water is untied by the earth... 1383

2005 - تهران ۱۳۸۴ · p. 192

millipede-moment

متن اصلی

لحظه با شتاب از کنار من گذشت من پی گرفتنش دوتا شدم بی‌خبر ز حالِ دل یکسره دویدم و هزارپا شدم در هوایِ هفته‌هایِ رفته‌ام از صفای آنِ دل جدا شدم. تهران ۱۳۸۴

Machine

The moment went past me in a hurry. Chasing it down, I bent double; knowing nothing of how my heart was, I ran flat out and turned into a millipede. In the air of my weeks that are gone I was cut off from the clearness of that heart's instant. Tehran 1384

Lantern

The moment went past me in a hurry. Chasing it down, I bent double; knowing nothing of how my heart was, I ran flat out and turned into a millipede. In the air of my weeks that are gone I was cut off from the clearness of that heart's instant. Tehran 1384

Translator's Notes

آن is at once *the instant* and *grace* — the quality that makes a face or a gesture compelling. The poem spends six lines chasing a moment and loses, in the last line, the other thing the word means.

2005 - تهران، بهار ۱۳۸۴ · p. 193

leaves-roots

متن اصلی

گفتی به من تکیه کن افرا آسمان را مهربان‌تر می‌کند گفتم تو ریشه در خاک نداری... برگ‌ها مسافران فضولند... برگ‌ها را سرما و گرما می‌سوزاند اما ریشه‌ها را نه... کاش از دیار دور... بر می‌گشتی... تهران، بهار ۱۳۸۴

Machine

You said, lean on me — the maple makes the sky kinder. I said: you have no root in the soil... Leaves are meddling travellers... Cold and heat burn the leaves but not the roots... If only you would come back... from that far country... Tehran, spring 1384

Lantern

You said: lean on me, the maple makes the sky kinder. I said: you have no root in the soil. Leaves are meddling travellers. Cold and heat burn the leaves but they do not burn the roots. If only you would come back from that far country... Tehran, spring 1384

Translator's Notes

Fourteen years before this, answering a magazine that had asked him how the war decade treated him, Jafari wrote: *cold and heat burn the leaves and the branches, but not the roots.* He says it again here, almost word for word, to somebody who has left the country — the same sentence used first to explain how he survived and then to argue that leaving is a kind of not having survived.

March 2005 - ۱۳۸۴/۱/۷ · p. 194

moonlit-house

متن اصلی

خانه با یادِ تو مهتابی‌ست... تشنه‌ام... اما... مهرِ رویت در دلم آبی‌ست... تشنگی... انگورِ سرخِ تاکِ بی‌تابی‌ست... دستِ پُر مهر تو جامم باد... جامِ بی‌عشقت حرامم باد... فصلِ باران... فصلِ بی‌آبی‌ست... ماهِ پشت ابر پنهان است... خانه با یاد تو... مهتابی‌ست... ۱۳۸۴/۱/۷

Machine

The house, remembering you, is full of moonlight... I am thirsty... and yet... the love of your face is blue water in my heart... Thirst... is the red grape of the restless vine... Let your kind hand be my cup... Let any cup without your love be forbidden me... The season of rain... is the season of no water... The moon is hidden behind the cloud... The house, remembering you... is full of moonlight... 1384/1/7

Lantern

The house, remembering you, is full of moonlight. I am thirsty — and even so the love of your face is blue water in my heart. Thirst is the red grape of the restless vine. Let your kind hand be my cup; let any cup without your love be forbidden me. The season of rain is the season of no water. The moon is hidden behind the cloud. The house, remembering you, is full of moonlight... 1384/1/7

2005 - ۱۳۸۴/۴ · p. 195

mirror-chance

متن اصلی

نشانی شوق را... از نگاهِ من بپرس... هر روز... پیش از آن که... در آینهٔ اتفاق ببینی... ۱۳۸۴/۴

Machine

Ask my eyes... for the address of longing... every day... before... you catch sight of it in the mirror of chance... 1384/4

Lantern

Ask my eyes for the address of longing, every day, before you catch sight of it in the mirror of chance... 1384/4

2006 - پاییز ۱۳۸۵ · p. 196

dervish-road

متن اصلی

وقتی که درویشی پریشان است چون در هوای وصل جانان است در هر بیابانی که راهی نیست، هرسو که پایش رفت رَه آنست. پا را چوبگذاری به راهِ دوست رفتارِ تو کاری خوش و نیکوست، تو رفته‌ای و جای پاهایت شاید که راهِ چشمهٔ آهوست... پاییز ۱۳۸۵

Machine

When a dervish is distracted, being in the air of union with the beloved, then in any wilderness where there is no road, whichever way his foot went — that is the road. Once you set foot on the friend's road your going is a good and a lovely work; you have gone, and the place of your feet may be the road to the gazelle's spring... Autumn 1385

Lantern

When a dervish is distracted, being in the air of union with the beloved, then in any wilderness where there is no road whichever way his foot went — that is the road. Once you set your foot on the friend's road your going is a good and a lovely work; you have gone, and the place of your feet may turn out to be the road to the gazelle's spring... Autumn 1385

2007 - زمستان ۱۳۸۵ · p. 197

transparent-angels

متن اصلی

تا به گلستان نرسی / روح رها نمی‌شود این همه شفافی تو / قسمت ما نمی‌شود اشک فرشته‌های تو / قاصدکِ رهایی‌اند تا به مژه نَشسته‌اند / شور به پا نمی‌شود کاش که شور می‌شدم / شوق و سرور می‌شدم مثل تو و فرشته‌ات / یک‌شبه نور می‌شدم گرچه که بندهای ما / یک‌شبه وا نمی‌شود وین رَهِ پرنشیب را / دس به عصا نمی‌شود این همه آزادی تو / قسمتِ ما نمی‌شود تا به گلستان نَرَسی / روح رها نمی‌شود زمستان ۱۳۸۵ آخرین نمایشگاه ایرج زند در گالری گلستان/ فرشته‌های شفاف

Machine

Until you reach the rose-garden / the soul is not set free. All this transparency of yours / is not our portion. The tears of your angels / are the dandelion-clocks of release; while they still sit on the lash / no rapture gets to its feet. If only I could turn to fervour / turn to longing and to joy, like you and your angel / turn to light in a single night. Though the bonds on us / do not come open in a night, and this steep road / is no road for a hand on a stick. All this freedom of yours / is not our portion. Until you reach the rose-garden / the soul is not set free. Winter 1385 Iraj Zand's last exhibition at Golestan Gallery / *Transparent Angels*

Lantern

Until you reach the rose-garden, the soul is not set free. All this transparency of yours is not our portion. The tears of your angels are the dandelion-clocks of release; while they still sit on the lash, no rapture gets to its feet. If only I could turn to fervour, turn to longing and to joy, and like you and your angel turn to light in a single night. Though the bonds on us do not come open in one night, and this steep road is no road for a hand on a stick. All this freedom of yours is not our portion. Until you reach the rose-garden, the soul is not set free. Winter 1385 Iraj Zand's last exhibition at Golestan Gallery / Transparent Angels

Translator's Notes

Iraj Zand died in ۱۳۸۶. The poem is dated from his last show, which was called *Transparent Angels*, and it is made almost entirely out of that title: the transparency, the angels, and their tears are the paintings on the wall. گلستان is a rose-garden and also the name of the gallery the show hung in, so the line *until you reach the rose-garden the soul is not set free* names the room the poem was written in and the paradise it is asking about, in one word. On the printed page the poem is set in two columns — the Persian way of laying out rhymed couplets, first half-line on the right, second on the left. It reads across, not down.

2008 - زمستان ۱۳۸۶ · p. 198

snow-shadow

متن اصلی

در کوچهٔ پر برف تو به انتظار ایستاده‌ام هوا آفتابی‌ست تو را می‌بینم که خندان می‌آیی من داغ می‌شوم سایه‌ام در برف فرو می‌رود... زمستان ۱۳۸۶

Machine

In your snow-filled lane I am standing, waiting. The weather is sunny. I see you coming, laughing. I go hot — and my shadow sinks away into the snow... Winter 1386

Lantern

In your snow-filled lane I am standing, waiting. The weather is sunny. I see you coming, laughing. I go hot, and my shadow sinks away into the snow... Winter 1386

Translator's Notes

A warm object standing on snow melts a hollow and settles into it. The poem lets that be the whole of what happens when he sees her.

2008 - زمستان ۱۳۸۶ · p. 199

wounded-gazelle

متن اصلی

من احساس برخورد باران به خاکم منم شوق مستی که در جان تاکَم گیاهم که تشنهٔ نسیم پگاهَم. کویرَم که از عشق باران هلاکم من آهوی زخمی تو سایهٔ گیاهی منم ابر شیطان تو فصل گناهی من از رنگ بی‌رنگی‌ام در ملالم تو سرخی و سبزی... سپیدی سیاهی. من اینم که هستم... همینم در این صف که میبینی عاشق‌ترینم... زمستان ۱۳۸۶

Machine

I am the feel of the rain striking my own earth. I am the longing of the drunkenness in the soul of my vine. I am the plant that thirsts for the dawn breeze. I am the desert undone by its love of the rain. I am your wounded gazelle, you the shade of a plant. I am the devil's own cloud, you the season of sin. I am wearied by the colour of my own colourlessness. You are red and green... white, black. I am this that I am... just this. In this row you see before you, I am the one most in love... Winter 1386

Lantern

I am the feel of the rain striking my own earth. I am the longing of the drunkenness in the soul of my vine. I am the plant that thirsts for the dawn breeze. I am the desert undone by its love of the rain. I am your wounded gazelle; you are the shade of a plant. I am the devil's own cloud; you are the season of sin. I am wearied by the colour of my own colourlessness. You are red and green... white, black. I am this that I am — just this. In this row you see before you, I am the one most in love... Winter 1386

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