Your baby, tonight

When my old dream

Came true at last

And my imagined Persian lover

Blossomed in the autumn of my life

Serendipitously,

It was no longer the same dream

And we were no longer

The lovers

I had imagined to be.

A wrinkle or two

Were stitched

On our skins

And pegged into our pasts

With little room left for new learning

Or openness

For new understandings.

And so conflicts stirred

Within us and between us

And froze unresolved

Like icicles of a harsh unending winter.

But still our passion like wild fires sprung up to the sky

And turned the clouds into giant roses.

Watching the snowfall

Whitening the autumn

Leaf by leaf and color by color

And watching the orange-blue flames

Of the burning wood

Watching us flame by flame

And tasting the scent of the wood

Tasting us log by log

I take her in my arms

Gently

And with my desirous fingers

I worship her divine skin

And reach for her soul

As if she were

A gift from Eros!

Tossing our discords aside

And glowing from my lustrous touch

She dons a poetic smile

That only Michelangelo could create.

And says sweetly like a happy Tar

"I wish I was young enough

To make your baby, tonight!"

And I reply sadly

Like an old croaking drum:

"And I wish you were not,

Being the quarreling babies we are!"

Time thrusting forward

Unconsciously

And without a conscience 

Buries dreams,

And the dreamers alike.

And as the fire goes black

And she says the last goodbye

With tears mixing with our last kiss

I feel entombed in the past

And scream at the heartless time

A scream of being buried alive in time.

"Time, stop ticking, this second

Leave me alone

Or else I will run away from my grave

With legs of bare bones

And a heart of broken valves!"

Poet
Professor Manoucher Parvin has published novels, poems, and short stories and numerous works in various sciences. His latest book is a novel-in-verse entitled: Dardedel: Rumi, Hafez, and Love in New York; published by The Permanent Press. New prints of Parvin‚s previously published novels: Cry for my Revolution, Iran, and Avicenna and I: The journey of spirits are forthcoming. Professor Parvin has served as President of two international organizations and TV and radio commentator here and abroad and has been on the editorial board of several scholarly journals. He has lectured in many countries of the world.