A Message On The Road

"We are the children of Iran," by Shapour from Iranian.com, August 12, 2008.

One day

I will come, and bring a message.

I will pour light into veins.

And will cry out: O’ whose baskets are full of sleep!

I brought you apples, the red apple of the sun

I will present to the beggar a jasmine flower.

I will give the pretty leper woman a gift of earrings.

I will tell the blind man: The garden is so spectacular!

I will be a peddler, peddle through alleys and cry out:

Dew, dew, dew.

A passerby will say: honestly, tonight is a dark night,

I will give her the Milky Way.

There is a legless girl on the bridge,

I will put a constellation of stars around her neck.

I will take away all the curses on the lips.

I will tear down all the walls.

Sohrab Sepehri

Translated by Mahvash Shahegh

Leave a poem for us if you like. Have a great Wednesday everybody!

Gratitude

I call this unnamed picture "Woman with Flowers." From Iranian.com, Photo by Horizon, a very gifted photographer in Tehran.

Someone has to remind me occasionally that life on the internet is not real. Or is it? Are the people we meet on the internet real? Are our relationships with those people behind the blogs limited to a few paragraphs the blogger writes and a few mindless or mindful comments we and others leave there? Do we ever get to meet the essence of the individuals behind the blogs and the comments? I'd like to think that we do. Though we might not be able to see the whole person, or all of that person, the parts that we do see and touch are real.

A sarcastic individual might tell me: "Get a life, lady!," but I would like to confess that I have laughed uncontrollably at some blogger's jokes, I have cried inconsolably at another blogger's woes, I have worried deeply about another blogger's dilemma, and I have spent a whole day thinking about some philosophical post I read somewhere. I get upset when a blogger who feels the blues turns off his or her comments, leaving me without a way to talk to him or her, to leave a greeting or to try to soothe the pain and to bring reminders of happier days, just like I would appreciate if someone did it for me. I am delighted when I read an intelligent comment by a reader, or see that the meaning of my post has found a home in his or her heart. I miss my readers and wonder why they haven't come back. My more experienced blogger friends tell me that one of these days I will grow tired of replying to every single comment, and that I, too, will only reply when a reply is warranted. Today I doubt that very much. Never in my life have I disregarded the greetings, Salam, of an indiviual. When someone talks to me, I answer. So, O.K., suppose that someday I get so many comments, I won't have time to deal with all of them on an individual basis! Until such day, I write to hear from people, and when I do, I reply.

More important than my daily posts, I love the dialogues that take place inside my comments section, where my readers show me their beautiful hearts and brilliant minds. I wrote my post last night, with a mind burdened with thought and a heart full of hope. I write this post tonight to thank all of you for commenting on yesterday's post, but specially Alef Shin, who surprisingly wrote in his perfect English (as opposed to his usual perfect Farsi), telling me that he has seen the love of motion inside my soul. I am grateful for that observation, mostly because until I read that comment, though I was quite aware of it, I had not been able to verbalize that love thoroughly myself. My heart is touched today by the knowledge that I am read and understood, and that is as real as it gets for me. Thank you to all.

Gift

Mina Momeni, Photography Collection at Elahe Gallery, Tehran, December 2007.

هدیه

من از نهایت شب حرف میزنم

من از نهایت تاریکی

و از نهایت شب حرف میزنم

اگر به خانه’ من آمدی برای من ای مهربان چراغ بیار

و یک دریچه که از آن

به ازدحام کوچه’ خوشبخت بنگرم

فروغ فرخزاد

Gift

I speak out of the deep of Night

Out of the deep of darkness I speak

And out of the deep of night

Should you come to my house, O Kind Soul,

Bring me a lamp and a window

Through which I may view the crowd

of the happy alley

Forough Farrokhzad, Another Birth, Translated by Ismail Salami

Is The Grass Greener On The Other Side?

This week in Tehran, Mohammad Kheirkhah, a talented young Iranian photographer, has a showing of several of his works, entitled "Iranian Woman" (Zane Irani). Look at this touching picture. Does it make you sad?

Abbas Kiarostami's Works in Berkeley

I am so excited! Starting this Sunday, July 8th, there will be an exhibition of Abbas Kiarostami's photography in UC Berkeley's Art Museum. This is to compliment his film series which will also be featured in UC Berkeley's Pacific Film Archives, capturing each stage of the director's remarkable career. Many of Kiarostami's films, especially his rarely screened early works made for the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults, will be shown. I guess now you know how I'll be spending my leisure time for the next two months! As I go and learn, I'll post my findings here. I can't wait to see the sweet and easy dialogues of love he has in his "Under the Olive Trees" again. I can't wait to look at the world through his optimistic and hopeful eyes. I can't wait to see the films I have never seen before. I'm so excited! If you live in this area, mark your calendars and go. You won't regret it.

Found the photo here.