We Make!

We "make" all that matters in life: 
We make art; we make love; we make peace! 

*Happy Valentine's Day, my dearest, mightiest J!

Secrets of Granite & Rain

Walking in the rain through the silence of the cemetery, 

she secretly hoped for it to rain once in a while after she is gone,

so her headstone, which she also secretly hoped to be of black granite, 

could shine with the rain. 

She could never afford to have granite countertops in her kitchen, 

but she secretly decided to save enough to get herself a black granite headstone or maybe gray!

She continued her walk. 

And the trees kept the secrets of granite and rain through the silence of the cemetery.

A Window Next To Her Weaving Loom!

Splash water on a red mud brick wall.

Press your face on the wall and take a deep, deep, breath!

Next to the scent of fried garlic and raspberry jam, 

rows of red mud bricks forming a wall in my lungs.  

There was a window next to her weaving loom.

Her bed was hidden behind the loom.

Her tender figure walked religiously around the tiny apartment,

telling stories of a house woven out of her tireless fingers;

A three-story house my grandfather built and her woven carpets paid for, brick by brick.

I remember that house with its red mud brick walls, two Iwans, six rooms, and a tiled blue pool that chilled our watermelons in the summers of Tehran.

I remember that garden.

On Fridays, my uncle with the garden hose sketched our silhouettes on the brick wall; our boney silhouettes evaporating, leaving an earthy trace in our lungs. 

She walked around her tiny apartment telling stories of witty princesses, fairies and genies, lions and mice, and in between the charm of her stories and our afternoon tea, she tied the knots of her memories into her latest carpet.

I did not see her last walk around her tiny apartment;

I was not there when her last carpet was cut off the loom;

I did not hear her last story.

In my lungs, a wall is being made of red mud bricks,

She is still walking

Walls are always mightier than windows, 

Walls surround; windows release.

There, between the scent of a wet mud brick wall and the magic of her stories, is a window with tulips on its frame.

Her weaving loom is resting in the light.

*In the memory of my grandmother, our Aziz. Happy International Women’s Day! Happy March 8th!

The Memory of Our Massacrous Hands!

The massacre occurred quietly on a Saturday afternoon.

Sunshine deceived us into the yard.

There, they were, with their tender existence; unnoticed! 

Fixing after a long forgotten storm did not take long; 

a couple of beers went quickly in between a nail-and-hammer argument. 

And all through, there they were, in the corners of a modest rectangular garden.

The massacre occurred quietly on a Saturday afternoon.

The soil remained under my finger nails through Sunday; a stain of a massacre in the name of order. 

Myosotis were gone, along with the other unwanted plants; weeds!  

Later that afternoon I remembered; Myosotis are also called forget-me-nots!

A tragic irony; forget-me-not!
How a tender existence is lost to the memory of our massacrous hands.

Foreigners In A Living Room

Its presence was felt,

not for its height, or its mighty radius branching out in my living room,

Its presence was felt,

not for the traces it left behind;

pieces of him that reminded me of Hansel’s trail of breadcrumbs,

pieces that made me fear for the day it would find its way back home,

and back home would not be with me in my living room,

very much so, that my living room did not belong to me,

or me to it! 

Its presence was felt,

not for the chain of the blue lights that I forced on it,

which shined through the night, proudly, like a train of a peacock on display,   

Its presence was felt,

not for its foreign aroma, belonging to a long-forgotten forest,

or for the happiness it brought to the eyes of a child once passed by my window,

Its presence was felt,

for the aura it left in me, that forced me to think of it as a He!

His presence,  

with a foreign aroma that chained me in an illuminated blue dream,

was felt!

His presence was felt, for it touched mine; 
we were two foreigners in a living room!

* For the mightiness the first christmas tree in my living room brought to my days. 

Remembering Heaney on His Funeral

Today the funeral ceremony of Seamus Heaney was held in his native Bellaghy. Heaney's poetry walks that rough path on the edge of quotidian events and mystical recognitions.  One of my favorite passages in literature comes from his poem Lovers on Aran.

"Did sea define the land or land the sea? 

Each drew new meaning from the waves' collision.
Sea broke on land to full identity."*

And of course my personal favorite for his forwardness and wit is this short piece which was written as an objection to being included in an anthology of British poetry in 1982. He recognized himself as Irish. 

"Be advised my passport's green.

No glass of ours was ever raised

to toast the Queen." 

Seamus Heaney was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1995 "for works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past".

* Lovers on Aran

The timeless waves, bright, sifting, broken glass,
Came dazzling around, into the rocks,
Came glinting, sifting from the Americas

To posess Aran. Or did Aran rush
to throw wide arms of rock around a tide
That yielded with an ebb, with a soft crash?

Did sea define the land or land the sea?
Each drew new meaning from the waves' collision.
Sea broke on land to full identity.

Romantic Sensibility & Existentialist Mind

How I find my self trapped in my ever-reducing sensations, which are damaged by the conditions of my existence, I do not know. And why is it that way, does not matter anymore.It should have never mattered.  Perhaps one day I will figure the ways in which the daily matters of existence operate. And I fear that day, for my days will be the most tedious after the figuration happens; when there are no more questions left, there will be no motivations to continue one's existence. I will consider myself 'learned' if one day I find the kind of conviction that Rilke displayed in his letters to "the young poet," the dear Mr. Kappus, for he despite his dilemmatic struggles writes: 

"But every thing that may someday be possible for many people, the solitary man can now,already, prepare and build with his own hands, which make fewer mistakes.Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away, you write, and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast. And if what is near you is far away, then your vastness is already among the stars and is very great; be happy about your growth, in which of course you can't take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don't torment them with your doubts and don't frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn't be able to comprehend. Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn't necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust. Avoid providing material for the drama, that is always stretched tight between parent and children; it uses up much of the children's strength and wastes the love of the elders, which acts and warms even if it doesn't comprehend Don't ask for any advice from them and don't expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it." [ Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, Worpswede, near Bremen, July 16, 1903.]

Maybe one day I will find such conviction, but for now, it is time for me to do the"heart-work!"*

*"The work of the eyes is done. Go now and do the heart-work on the images imprisoned within you." [Rilke, Wendung (Turning Point)]

Once Called a Sensation!

The murmur of the moments past,

And the resistance of the vanishing memories,

Shape the nostalgic residues of something once called a sensation!

A shape so abstract to the mind that its existence is not recognized.

And so in its unnoticed existence liberation begins!  

Sense Of Something Coming (Rilke)

I am like a flag in the center of open space.
I sense ahead the wind which is coming, and must live
it through.
while the things of the world still do not move:
the doors still close softly, and the chimneys are full
of silence,
the windows do not rattle yet, and the dust still lies down.

I already know the storm, and I am troubled as the sea.
I leap out, and fall back,
and throw myself out, and am absolutely alone
in the great storm.


Rainer Maria Rilke

Translated by Robert Bly

Your Colors!

When colors brush on a surface;

that reflection of light, 

that trace of matter, 

When colors touch another existence;

that tapping of heart beats, 

that pulse of emotions,

When your colors,

the vibrant colors of your complexion; the gentle colors of your aura,   

all those colors that together form the charming existence that is you,  

When your colors,

murmur to my eyes, 

I become a rainbow!

No need for rain, no need for sunshine, Just you!

The reflection of your celestial light that leaves a tender trace on my matter! 

No need for rain, no need for sunshine,  Just you!

The tapping of your lively beat that creates an untouchable pulse in me!

When your colors,

murmur to my eyes,

I become a rainbow!

* For D.T.F.

Like Two Feathers ...

Like two feathers,

dancing in the marvels of the space,

leaving a golden imprint behind,

Like two feathers,

Captured and freed,

Like two feathers, golden feathers,

touching the sapphire corners of a dream, 

in a weightless sail to an endless delight, 

Like two feathers,

We dance to the golden melody of each other’s eyes,

Like two feathers

We leave the whispered curves of our motion in the sapphire corners of our dream!

Like two feathers we weightlessly sail  to an endless delight!  



- For  D.T.F.

A Short Walk!

A short walk;
A short walk around the kitchen,
A short walk around the yard,
A short walk around the neighborhood,
A short walk around the classroom,
A short walk that was stretching, exhausting, and seemingly- never-ending,
It was a short walk around the year that surrounded the entity that is often called "life"!

With Baudelaire!

“Remembering is only a new form of suffering.”  
- Baudelaire, Charles, La Fanfarlo, 1847.

Autumn Serenity!

The impossibility and the possibility of lost sensations! 

In this plight, 

when the fiery autumn pours over the paved particles of my memory,

The longing for serenity begins!

 

Burn Like Silk!

Silk burns itself out!

The autumn quietly walks into the small yard.

The cat hums to the burning leaves!

The desire to burn like silk, smooth, clean, and calm, takes over the fiery leaves!

(An Autumn Haiku!)

A Very Simple Secret!

Every once in a while, sometimes everyday, I need to remind myself of this very simple secret!

  

And he went back to meet the fox.

"Goodbye," he said.

"Goodbye," said the fox. "And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

"What is essential is invisible to the eye," the little prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember. [...]
(Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince, Chapter 21(the Fox),1943)

Soldier Student!

She was uncomfortable the first time she walked into my office. It was the second week of the classes. I knew her face, but for names, as always, I had to check the class roster. She was tall with strong arms. Her hair was short and silky. Her eyes… I wish I remembered. I wish I looked at them better and for longer. She was a soldier. Four years in Iraq and Afghanistan. Honorably discharged. She knew three languages. She was an athlete; best at volleyball. 

I remember the first thing she said, after I asked her to take the seat next to me. In a low voice she said, “I have never done this before.” I wasn’t sure what she meant. She sat there. She didn’t offer more explanation. I asked, “ Do you mean you never had an art course before?” She looked at me and said, “Ya, I did drawing in school. But not art history. We didn’t need to talk about art.” I understood. I said, “I know, it is strange to talk about art and how you feel about it.” She said, “I like to. But I don’t know how.” I told her how this class will help and that she should come to my office hours if she needs any help with the course.

She was hardworking. She stopped by my office almost every week. She sat in the back of the class. Never volunteered any answers. On exam weeks she looked more uncomfortable. Sometimes I could see her frustration. She liked Renoir. I saw her joking once with other students outside the class, but the moment she noticed me she swallowed her laughter. She was too polite with me.

I am trying to remember as much as I can of her.  She was thirty-two last autumn. Two days a week for sixteen weeks! That’s the memory pool I am fishing into. Sixteen weeks! It may be enough for an introductory course to the visual arts, but it is not long enough to know a student and definitely not enough to know a soldier!

Once she came to the office with a male friend; a classmate perhaps form her other courses. He was not in my class. He said hi and stood in the corridor near the exit, while she discussed her paper topic with me. She chose to write on Lorenzo Lippi’s painting, St. Agatha. I liked her paper topic. She left the office. I did not look to see if she held hands with the guy. Now I wish I did. I don’t know if they were together. She once mentioned something about her ex. I don’t remember.  She got ninety on her paper. I could see how she was engrossed by Lippi’s ability in capturing a look of innocence and determination within a playful setting.

In the last day of our class I had my climbing shoes with me, planning to go for bouldering after the exam. She saw the shoes. She liked climbing. We talked about going for a climb in spring. It was just a talk. One of those talks that never actualizes and we both knew it. That was the last I saw her.

I wish I knew what was her favorite color. I wish I knew her favorite book, her favorite song, her favorite movie. I wish I knew her. She was a soldier. She survived the war. I am trying to remember as much as I can. I want to remember everything about her; a student, my student, who passed away three days ago in a car accident. I wish I could remember the color of her eyes! 

And in-between!

Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, there is something curious about that, and in-between!

The Never-ending Edge!

That never-ending canvas, 

That unforgettable splash,

That splash on the edge,

When the edge is created,

The canvas ends and the edge is never-ending! 

Detail, Number 1A, Jackson Pollock,