An ECFC multi-voiced blog about what’s happening at ECFC, today we hear from a Poet, Radmehr, about his personal journey and the situation in Iran
Poetry
ECFC blogs are partly about people’s voices and their creativity, where the very broad range of distinctive strands of the ECFC story can weave together. In the last ECFC blog, Babak reported on the protests in Iran: some of the impacts internationally and at the level of our church and how we can think about it compassionately and prayerfully. We’ve since moved to fearful destruction in Iran alongside hope of a better future.
In this blog we hear from an Iranian poet, Radmehr, about his personal journey of pain and loss but also hope. It should be emphasised that these are personal viewpoints and not representative of ECFC’s views.
So, here is Radmehr’s moving poem (shared with kind permission and written before the ongoing US intervention), which is followed by fragments of ensuing voice and WhatsApp messages with Radmehr as we prepared the blog:
In the name of those
who, at dawn of bullets,
called out the name of freedom
and with their own blood
painted the morning…
O my departed friends,
O smiling colleagues of yesterday,
your smiles still shine
in a corner of my memory,
like a lamp in a house that is no more.
You blossomed
and you left,
and within me
a branch broke.
My soul fell silent,
not from the absence of sound,
but from the heaviness of a breath
I do not feel worthy to take.
Shame,
like a long shadow,
follows me.
It whispers:
You stayed.
You were afraid.
You became a refugee…
Yes,
I became a refugee;
with a suitcase full of your names
and a homeland lodged in my throat.
And how bitter is the confession that turns in my heart:
perhaps it would have been more beautiful
if we had taken the bullets together,
hand in hand,
beneath one sky,
with one cry.
Perhaps it would have been more beautiful
if our blood had flowed in the same soil
and our names had rested side by side
upon a cold stone.
I asked the government of this land
to take back my asylum,
I said, let me return
so I may die for my homeland,
so that perhaps
the shame of surviving
might grow lighter.
I said how beautiful is the soil
where death
is bound to freedom…
But when night falls,
in the silence of my room,
I ask myself:
Would you have wanted death for me?
Or a life
that carries your names
like a flag in the wind?
O luminous ones who departed,
if I remained,
it was not from lack of love,
nor from forgetting,
but from a human fear
in a heart
that still beats.
And perhaps one day I will understand
that to remain alive, too,
is a form of loyalty;
a quiet kind of resistance
in an exile that begins each morning
with the memory of you.
به نام آنان
که در سپیدهدمِ گلولهها
نامِ آزادی را فریاد زدند
و با خونِ خویش
صبح را رنگ زدند…
ای دوستانِ رفتهٔ من،
ای همکارانِ خندانِ دیروز،
لبخندهای شما هنوز
در گوشهای از خاطرهٔ من میدرخشند،
چون چراغی در خانهای
که دیگر نیست.
شکفتید
و رفتید،
و در درونِ من
شاخهای شکست.
روحِ من خاموش شد،
نه از نبودِ صدا،
بلکه از سنگینیِ نفسی
که خود را شایستهٔ کشیدنش نمیدانم.
شرم،
چون سایهای بلند،
دنبالم میآید.
در گوشم زمزمه میکند:
تو ماندی.
تو ترسیدی.
تو پناهنده شدی…
آری،
من پناهنده شدم؛
با چمدانی پُر از نامهای شما
و وطنی
که در گلویم گیر کرده است.
و چه تلخ است اعترافی
که در دل من میچرخد:
شاید زیباتر میبود
اگر گلولهها را با هم میگرفتیم،
دست در دست،
زیر یک آسمان،
با یک فریاد.
شاید زیباتر میبود
اگر خونِ ما در یک خاک جاری میشد
و نامهایمان در کنار هم
بر سنگی سرد
آرام میگرفت.
از دولتِ این سرزمین خواستم
پناهندگیام را پس بگیرد،
گفتم بگذار بازگردم
تا برای میهنم بمیرم،
شاید
شرمِ زنده ماندن
اندکی سبکتر شود.
گفتم چه زیباست آن خاک
که در آن
مرگ
به آزادی گره خورده است…
اما وقتی شب فرومیرسد،
در سکوتِ اتاقم،
از خود میپرسم:
آیا شما مرگ را برای من میخواستید؟
یا زندگیای را
که نامهای شما را
چون پرچمی در باد
با خود حمل میکند؟
ای روشنانِ رفته،
اگر من ماندم،
نه از کمبودِ عشق بود
و نه از فراموشی،
بلکه از ترسی انسانی
در قلبی
که هنوز میتپد.
و شاید روزی بفهمم
که زنده ماندن نیز
خود نوعی وفاداری است؛
گونهای خاموش از مقاومت
در تبعیدی که هر صبح
با یادِ شما
آغاز میشود.
Radmehr gives a little of the story of how he came to write poems:
When I was in Iran, because there was never freedom of expression or democracy, I always had to censor myself. But in the UK, since I encountered freedom of expression, the number of my poems increased.
I learned to write poetry from my literature teacher in high school. That poetry introduced me to the great poets of Iran and the world, like Hafez, Goethe, and Shakespeare, and it had a profound impact on me.
Radmehr explains that he wrote this poem for Iranians in the revolution. The poem was for the people of his country. When prompted about the current situation, more words quickly flowed in response over WhatsApp:
Dear people of the UK, you must know that this war is not against the people of Iran; it is for the people of Iran. Although we are worried about our families, nothing is more dangerous than the continuation of this terrorist regime. Do not forget that Iran’s terrorist regime does not understand the language of democracy; it understands the language of force and war. Do not forget: although war is bad, sometimes it is the only solution. If you study the history of democracy in many countries such as France, Japan, and Italy, you will see that democracy in many nations came through war. Do not forget that sometimes, to treat cancer, surgery is needed. Although surgery involves blood and pain, what matters most is curing the cancer.
Maybe Radmehr’s poetry about the hoped for revolution and his words about whatever it is that is unfolding before our eyes, will enhance our understanding of an Iranian perspective. Each of us has our perspective. But it is vital that we try to understand others’; try to understand God’s.