Dancing Tango

Oh, Orlando!
Remember the night we danced
quietly on the sands where music
was played? Your words were
wonderers, said quietly
in the pockets of my ears.

Oh, Esphahan!
With your turquoise blue mosques
and lovers hiding under the sands
by the Zayandeh-rood and its haunting
blue skies. Still the words did
wonders when they were said quietly
in the pockets of my ears.

Time is eternity, my dignity
resides in yours and your
words are wonders that I count
as precious coins kept quietly
in the pockets of my tears.

Sheema Kalbasi

A poem by Maryam Hoole:

I can't but I do

I can't but I do
I do but I can't
what a selection of strife is my life!!
what a stupid life is my strength!
at my half ...

walk in my half!
half of my shame ...
half of my love ...
half of my lie ...

I can't but I do
I do but I can't

successfully I repeat my half
exactly I'm all of my many halves ...

come near ... to me
come to one of my parts!
with another part of my lie I love you!
with another part of my love I lie to you!

bring me back to my first part
I don't know myself!
myself is scared of me ...
go back please!
and take my first part
give it to me!
oh ... my mirror!
go back please!

Jahanshah Javid: "Did I mention this before? I was just thinking about this, again. It has preoccupied my mind quite a bit. In "Monsieur Ibrahim", Omar Sharif had a lot of good lines that made you think. The one I keep remembering is this -- it's not an exact quote: "If you keep it inside, it's lost forever." Think about that. All that you and I hold inside will be lost forever if we don't talk about it, if we don't show it, express it, share it. Think about it. Once you and I leave this world, everything we know is lost forever. There's no greater loss."

Noam Chomsky has a blog now.

The poem The Blessed One is turning into a dance performance in CA. There will be DVDs of the performance - well that's the news for now.

On top of the black velvet of despair
I lay dreaming of a golden love
and the white satins of a safe shore
and a life where falling stars
are not just some objects that are
far from my short knitted hands
to catch and hold and pair
with the moons and the Sun.


...mama you're that safe shore. I miss you.

...and happy one year of blogging to me.

for my mother

When my palms were still growing

When my palms were still growing
to reach the white berries
on the carved tree of memories
with one heart and two initials...

I remembered her eyes
behind the car window
knocking with two fingers
and a great wide-open smile
with a pearl necklace sitting inside her mouth/ calling my name: -
in a quiet voice, so that no one heard her
-not even the wind... that was touching/ teasing her face-


she is lost
she is lost forever
and forever I have lost
that woman who knocked on the window with two fingers
and a mouth full of white pearls...


In a parking lot
where I sat and remembered
the woman who knocked
on the window with two fingers
and a mouth full of white pearls/who quietly called my name
-so that the little girl would not wake up
in the back of my dreams- is now covered in white roseleaves.




...And in the parking lot
pinching the white off memories
the white berries turn purple from my grief.

I am a woman from the third world

and my poem
is the words of one
whose hands were cut
by the ax of oppression
from her body.


freedom
remain

All that is me (Even From This Distance)


1.

Even from this distance
I feel the icicles of sadness
hang deep from your tears
as you walk alone
in the Garden of the Lost Hearts

and I watch from the bower near the entrance
which is covered in roses and dust,
your shawl placed over your head
so that your mourning is lost
to the shadows that cling fingers of loss
across the landscape of your life.

When you will return I do not know
but please do remember
that looking over a certain happy alley
there is a certain window
where sits a single lantern
that cuts through the shadows
to illuminate the place
where we stood
with our fingers entwined.


2.

All that is me
is an atom in a box,
one who is merely a minute unit,
powerless and insignificant in the ways of life,
who has yet to give birth to my Jericho

but first I await my longest of walks
beside the river-road
with baby Jesus in my arms.

I will hand him to you
to hold and love
but first I must find you
in the crowd of pilgrimage
from a distance where
the icicles of sadness
hang deep from my tears

while I walk alone
in this Garden of the Lost Hearts
as I watch from the bower
near the entrance which is covered
in roses and dust,
my shawl placed over my head

where my mourning
sits a single lantern
in the shadows
of loss across the landscape
of a never-returnable journey
for her to find the way.

Sheema Kalbasi and Roger Humes

Jericho: Believed to be the oldest city in the world. Today a thriving market-town near the northwest shore of the Dead Sea with the archaeological remains of a 7th century palace and ancient synagogue.

The Heart Melts To Stone In The City Of Glass

In the City of Glass the sky is either
slate-gray cold weeping the tears of God
or washed pale-blue beneath the iron-gold
of the unrelenting sun that sucks the marrow
from the bodies that move upon its streets.

In the City of Glass the faces all blend together
as one, all alike, no difference in thought,
action, or deed, the faces utter the same words,
the faces move with the same step in a land
where one learns that when people have everything
in the end they discover all that they have is nothing.

In the City of Glass the stones, sleek, cool, and full
of malice are thrown at those who dare draw
their curtains, are thrown at those who dare to question
that when everyone slides toward conformity
there is no way they could be any more different.

In the City of Glass the lanterns light the shadows
in long sweeping arcs and burn so deep, so deep within
the soul that unquestioned unhappiness is a foregone
conclusion, and if any attempts to raise his head
above this rut into which they all trod those wrapped
in the cloth of righteousness crucify him
with the unrelenting passion of the damned.

In the City of Glass the heart melts to stone.

Sheema Kalbasi and Roger Humes

Maman,

Ever since I opened my eyes into yours
my love for you has evenly spread in my body
like when spirits grow into humans
and become mothers and daughters...

I died as a mineral and became a plant,
I died as plant and rose to animal,
I died as animal and I was Man.
Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?
Yet once more I shall die as Man, to soar
With angels bless'd; but even from angelhood
I must pass on: all except God doth perish.
When I have sacrificed my angel-soul,
I shall become what no mind e'er conceived.
Oh, let me not exist! for Non-existence
Proclaims in organ tones,
To Him we shall return.

Rumi

A toaster morning!
I am exhausted: The little girl has a new found love. She takes off her cloths and I have to run after her to put her clothes back on.

As we say in Persian: The night is young...