Subject:

Comments:
: : : : ROYA : : March 2000 : : By: Amil : : Today is the first day of spring. I am drowned into my thoughts and longing that I have had for so long to return home and breath the air and the remaining oxygen on the streets of Tehran. I have this feeling every year at the same time, at the first day of spring. If you have not been homesick, then you don't know what it is to be homesick. You don't know what it means to feel that sense of loss, the pain of nostalgia. : : The mere fact that there are so much noise and movements "Jonb-o-joush va Hayaahoo" and so much life...wants me to go back in time. I recall when we were kids and how happy and invigorated we were, without any reasons. We couldn't wait to try out our new garments and go to our grandparents' home. ohh..even thinking about that makes me want to exude tears. : : Our grandparents are long gone, the country I used to know, everyone tells me is not the same. But, a man must have a purpose to live and I have always lived in hope to be back home. Perhaps I am afraid to find out that ... that it isn't what it used to be, perhaps I am afraid to shatter my memories, the memories of my childhood on the streets of Tehran. Perhaps I am afraid to become even more dejected. I guess I am crying out-loud, well that's just fine because that is how I feel now, on the first day of spring. : : How can I be so convivial when my mind is too far from here; when my mind is lost between the tortuous roads in Shemiran and the winding streets in Vanak? You figure! Now that I have a little placidity outside my balcony, I will tell you a little about me without acting dubious. : : In my home, everything was arranged very formally. In my home, like many other places that I have lived, I have always felt alone, but I have always felt that I could relate with so many of my countrymen. May be ... may be that's why we all try to runaway from each other, may be we see our shadows in each others eyes so vividly. I feel that we all have the same pain that just won't go away. But for me, this pain is becoming so malignant. This pain is becoming so undulant like an excrescence. That's why I am telling you about this pain. : : I had a torrid pion for poetry ever since I remember myself. In that young age, so sensitive, so naive, I started reading Forough Farrokhzad's poems. I just could feel her poetry, I could relate with her and I wanted to scream with her and say ... Aay Mardome... Mardome...Mardome. : : Another Birth (Tavalodi Deegar) showed her to be an outstanding poetess. No matter where I started to read from her poetry, I would always end up in "I'm Depressed" (Delam Gerefteh ast): : : "I am depressed, o so depressed. : : I go to the porch and extend my fingers : : over the taut skin of night : : the lamps that link are dark, o so dark. : : No one will introduce me to the sunlight : : or escort me : : to the sparrows' gathering. : : Commit flight to memory, : : for the bird is mortal." : : I will always remember her flight and I will always remember the bird. : : Later in life, I rediscovered myself when I got to know, at the time hard to elucidate, Sohrab's poems. Sohrab Sepehri's poems, took me, no I should say, elevated me to heaven. It created euphoria in my life. If Forough made me want to scream, Sohrab made me want to fly and yell "Aay Shabnam, Shabnam, Shabnam...still reverberates in my mind. : : As I found out later that the true 20th century Iranian prophet who had spoken to his people with so much truthfulness and had brought so much Noor (Light) for his people, now himself is among the power of darkness. " Be soraagh-e man agar mi'aaid Posht-e hichestaanam." The death of Sohrab was another devastation for humanity. The man who said "Midaanam ke agar sabzeh-e ra bekanam khaa'ham mord" is dead. I have always wondered, is it possible that anyone can say anything more meaningful and sincere and magnificent in such way that Sohrab had described? I felt like he had said it all. His mission was accomplished and now he had joined the company of Rumis, Nimas, Sa'dis, Hafezs, Ferdowsis, Khayyams... All those whom I considered prophets of their time now all are connected through their catacombs. Now, they all are immortal until the end of time and beyond. : : "Marg Paa'yaan-e Kaboutar Nist. : : Marg Varooneh-ye yek Zanjeer Nist. : : Marg Baa Khoosheh-ye Angour Mi'aayad be Dahaan : : Marg M'oul-e Ghashangi-e par-e Shaaparak ast : : Va Hameh midaneem ke ree-yehaa-ye Lezat, Por-e Oxijen-e Marg ast" : : Few weeks ago, I was in an oblivion mood. Yes, another prophet of Iran had ped away, Nader Naderpour. How fast and quick he departed us all and left his disciples so confused and lost. Perhaps his immense longing for returning home took his last drop... : : "Ey Marg, Ey Sepideh-dam Door : : Bar in Shab-e Siah Forou Taab : : Tanha dar Entezareh To Hastam : : Beshetab Ey Nayamadeh, Beshetaab" : : And just like that Nader joined the ranks of elite. Now he can be with his inspirational mentor, Ferdowsi for eternal life. His soul will always enflame us all. : : With poetry of course there must be a great love. I don't remember how young I was when I first discovered love. Love that had a name. Roya (dream) it was. Yes, there was a young girl around my neighborhood whom I was totally in love with. I am telling you the truth, a true love that only one would find in stories. A great love. : : A perfect love is an illusion! : : But her love, like an avid wave in the ocean, : : Always revived my stagnant life, : : Always twisting and turning, : : Always aggregating, : : Always gloating, : : Drifting... : : I shall live for my love, You shall be with me forever. I was ingraining these deep thoughts in me, as if I was afraid that someday it might be evaporated from my thoughts. All my life I've been a symbol, a symbol of eternal challenges within myself. Within an abstraction. But I long to be a human, a human who has immense feelings for love. Love is everything to me. As I am writing this I wonder what happened to my dear Roya? The young girl who inspired me and created a sense of being human in me. The young dream who made me stay up late all nights and dig out into love books to a find a definition of true love. May be there was a better way to say I love you. But was there a better way? How do you say I love you when you mean I want to die for you? No books could ever help the way I was feeling. The only remedy at the time seemed to be writing it down on a piece of paper and try to make some sense out of it. I still have those papers, but locked in my private library at my home in Tehran. Could I ever look at them again? Look at all those long hours of my pain and poetry which symbolized my eternal fight with life. I am not certain. Should I thank the almighty God who caused me to be born so I could feel the pain? I don't know. But, I know one thing, I still feel her, I still smell her scent like when she was ping through our street. It was very strange, how in the world someone at that young age could be so much in love? It couldn't be possible, but I do not believe a soul could have ever loved anyone as much as I loved my Roya. Yet, so innocent and pure and so scared to reveal my love for her. Still wonder, had she known? : : Roya was my dream, : : A dream which was a creation of my thoughts. : : A dream that nourished me, : : And gave me reasons to live, : : Gave me reasons to love. : : A dream that I used to know, : : A dream that I used to love. : : As I am writing this, my thoughts are becoming numb and nebulous and somewhat heavy. There is a penchant for taking you with me deeper than life. Some place where angels fly. I am not sure the rendition of this, but I know that you know. I know that you are with me. : : There are things and there are moments in everyone's life that one could go out and be lost in it and forget the world and oneself. I am at that moment now. At the first day of spring. I am inviting you to come with me; to come into my anecdote, and walk with me into my dream. : : Last night I had a strange dream. I dreamt that I was walking on the ruins of "Tekht-e Jamshid." Although I don't have any vivid memories of the area, it was as if, that I had lived in the Apadana palace for sometimes. I could see my steps, were moving towards the elements of the past. How splendid, how magnificent, how impervious. Suddenly this poem from the great Ferdowsi went through my mind: : : "Namiram ke az in p man zendeh'am, : : Ke tokhm-e sokhan ra paraakandeh'am" : : "I am deathless, I am the eternal Lord : : For I have spread the seed of the Word." : : Even though the dissolution of the palace was obvious, but it was as if the Splendor of Persia was intact. How could anyone walk on the ruins of Persepolis and not feel the majestic power of Persians ? After 2500 years still stands, like the Persians themselves, under the Lion and the Sun of Persia. : : In my dream, : : I was utterly spellbound. : : I was totally enthralled, : : I could see so far, : : I could see the deserts, : : filled with oceans, : : I could feel all my vibes, : : filled with emotions. : : How glorifying was this commotion! : : I felt that I was part the air, part of the dust. I was a Pantheist. The God of Persia and the God of nature had become one. How resolute everything seemed to be. I seemed to be at my highest culmination. I seemed to be at the acme of my life. Now I understand why Persians are a different breed of mankind! I understand why Persians have so much nostalgia for home. They have survived from the invasions of many arrogant and each time they became stronger than the last. These were indelible dreams. These were everlasting memories. : : Besides poetry, I have always had a pion for painting Miniatures, at least in those days that I lived in Iran. I still do paint sometimes, but it only gravitates me and reconnects me back to home. Anything and everything that has the slightest Persian touch in it, takes my mind back to Iran. Back to reunification between me and the country I left behind. Each time that I think of home, it will be accompanied by some tears. Each time that I think of home, I think of my Roya. : : As I was ruminating with these thoughts, I recalled the time that I spent in yet another magnificent place in my country. But, this time it was not a dream. Esfahan, Iran's most beautiful city. I still have this pion to revisit Esfehan, that historic city with so many Domes and "Naghsh-o-Negar." Paintings on every corner and on each wall. It was as if God himself had come down and painted the entire antiquities. I still can see my picture reflected in the water of the pool in " Kakh-e chehel So-toon" (Forty pillars Palace) like the pillars themselves. : : But my picture was not the only reflection in the pool. Yes, my dream girl Roya, by total coincidence and by total irony, was standing on the other side of the pool. How could this be possible? In the city of God, among the most beautiful relics of human history, there was this heavenly girl who stood there and was looking at her shadow in the water. It seemed that the palace of "chehel So-toon" and Roya were intertwined. How insidiously works this nature! I thought I was having tachycardia. When I think about it, my heart always raced when I saw Roya around. But this time it was different, this was totally unexpected. Right in front of my eyes, in an afternoon summer time, in the majestic palace of "Chehel So-toon." Who would have thought? : : For a moment I closed my eyes. I needed to have some reurances. I needed to make sure that what I was seeing was real. I am not quite sure for how long I closed my eyes, when I opened them, She was gone. She was gone. Indeed that was the last glimpse that I had of her before leaving Iran. After all these years, I can still remember her, standing by that majestic pool of "Chehel So-toon" : : From my balcony, I can overhear the arrival of spring. It is indeed the first day of spring. It came suddenly, and with the same euphony as it has come in the past. My mind still is simmering with the thoughts of home and Roya, but it is a mellifluous thought. A thought that will keep me alive and will keep my pion and my quest for love and home burning, until the end of my time. : : : :

Optional Link URL:
Link Title:
Optional Image URL: