English

 

                                   

 

TELL ME TO WRITE

 

 

Tell me,

Tell me

            to write!

 

Your words

Are the first dream

Lingering in the imagination of day

And the pauses between them

Are like the hidden melody in wine.

 

My witness

The tears of a drowned man

Wept under water.

 

 

Tell me,

            how did the earth turn yesterday?

            why isn’t the earth turning today?

 

I like what you say:

            ‘let’s migrate to a paradise

             far away from the wisdom of prophets!’

 

 

As soon as you begin,

My notebook moves aside

And listens;

And my pen’s not writing, it’s listening!

 

 

My poem

            forgets

                        my name.

 

Let them write and write –

Those who don’t hear the voice

That takes you and me

                                   to union.

 

 

How am i to write?

Your words

            make my pen  

                                  swoon. . .           

 

 

 translated from the persian by robert chandler

 

 

 

 

WOMAN'S MIRACLE

 

 

Desert . . .

         and the incendiary sun. .

But,

woman’s tongue is moist!                 

 

She licks the thorn's dream

Blossoms sprout on the tip of its claws

She licks the soil's dream

                                   a fountain emerges

She licks the stone's dream

                                   it bears fruit                                  

She licks the dream of the driest leaf

                                                    taken by the wind

It jumps back on the bough

 

And woman?

Dances in heaven!

 

 

 

 Translated from the Persian by Mehrangiz Rassapour

 

Edited by Catherine Davidson