NIGHTMARE
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Kristallnacht
15-Apr-2010
The present poem recounts the horrible events of that nightmare of a night in a quasi-delirious, almost hallucinatory fashion. The brackets designate those moments when the observer pauses the narrative to loudly protest the painful scenes, which are taking place before the eyes.
Kristallnacht
The Night of the Broken Glass
Behold!
Watch over the mothers!
Behold!
Watch over the mother,
Whose fear-poisoned breast
Is feeding bitter milk
Into the mouth of the startled child.
[Alas,
Sacrilege and lunacy
Harden daggers
In the acerbity of blood.]
Behold!
Watch over the newborns
—These fragile hopes of a better tomorrow;
Watch over them, please,
For the sake of God;
His Will was never meant
To cleanse the temple’s altar
By the ablution of the virgins’ blood.
[This is no more
The scent of the incense,
Or the fragrance of the oudh,
Which passes now,
On the wings of the wind,
Over the dark alleys of the night.]
*
Then,
Through the long fear of the mortiferous night,
We saw
The ignorance-tainted blindness of contempt
—That onset
Of the return
Of the slaughter, the crime—
So vividly, in our sight;
And we listened
’Til the jubilant cries of the drunkards
Merged with those supplicant pleas
That asked in tears,
“I beg thy forgiveness,
Oh, Thou, the Almighty God…”
*
And why,
At this autumn night,
When deciduous trees shed leaves,
There sprang, everywhere,
Red poppies, these flowers of love,
From the faint cold of the soil;
There bloomed red poppies,
From the callous heart
Of history’s
Stone-paved road.
*
Look!
Look, now!
Look!
Look, how
The ghosts of shrouded holy men
Are saving Jehovah’s name
—Which shineth brightly whence
The columns of the holy scrolls—
From the raging fire of hatred’s flames.
[This deceitful light of the fire
At the heart of this pitch-black dark
Couldn’t have ever been taken
As the glowing rays of
Shechina2—God’s Holy Light.]
*
Canst thou hear
The dreadful wail
Of the shofar3, crying
From the hilltops of Gilead?
*
These corps after corps of the ghosts,
Are the wandering souls,
Who’ve lost their graves,
Even as themselves
Were once victims—
These white-clad crowd,
Who’ve now risen
From the ruins
Of the unmarked tombs
Of centuries past.
[Perhaps
The rebel martyrs of bygone ages,
At last,
The roar of their cries
Would stir
The colossal heart of God.]
*
And at long last,
The trace of the crimson thread
Joins now
The frigid cold of the gates of a heart
Devoid of the grace of love’s shining light,
A heart, itself
Forever drowned
In the ice-melt of its own blood.
*
But may the hands
Of the vicious hangmen
Forever be
Heavy with pain,
Who by the slingshot of their fists
—Filled with the fossils of ancient hate—
Broke down,
So sudden,
That night,
The silence
Of the crystal of kindness
Off of the blue calm
Of heaven’s dome.
*
Nay,
This is no more
The scent of the incense,
Or the fragrance of the oudh,
Which passes now,
On the wings of the wind,
Over the dark alleys of the night…
Jahangir Sedaghatfar
Tiburon, November 1997
English translation: Los Angeles
November 2008, Payman Akhlaghi
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Rosie Jaan ...
by Darius Kadivar on Sun Apr 18, 2010 08:14 AM PDTSorry But You sound Paranormal at times ...
Omid Djalili: The Infidel
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGkz6gDLciA
Frost over the World - Omid Djalili :
British-Iranian comedian Omid Djalili is used to playing with cultural stereotypes. Last year he took on Fagin in the musical, Oliver, and in his new film, the comedy The Infidel he stars as a Muslim man who discovers that he is in fact Jewish. So can religion be funny and where exactly do you draw the line?
//www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnGn6j1RO64
Recommended Reading:
In The Arena With Omid Djalili By Darius KADIVAR
dk
by Was Rosie on Sun Apr 18, 2010 12:52 AM PDT//iranian.com/main/blog/rosie-roxy-roshan/nazi-state-israel-state-mind-part-i-hiroshima-1
telepathy or proof of common sense
by humanbeing on Sat Apr 17, 2010 11:36 AM PDTyou can interpret the mutual association with yeshiva as telepathy, or as proof that it is relevant common sense. i think the latter.
why did you censor yourself? perhaps because the blog is called 'kristallnacht'. this is what is so great about cyberspace, we can dare to speak the unspeakable, and to explore our curiosities, but that means exposing some politically incorrect things. maybe unpleasant clashes. it's a challenge, but well worth it.
to the matter at hand, in my opinion knowledge is not only on some laptop at starbucks, on wiki, or in some university of cleanshaven students studying the texts of dead white european males. (btw in the universities here there are seculars, orthodox, women in hijab, women in jewish headcoverings, women in miniskirts, men with earrings browrings nipplerings you name it, with kaffiyehs, bareheaded men, men with knit skullcaps, black velvet skullcaps, 'lawrence of arabia' types from northern europe who want exotic orient 'low-cal', fuqaha' wannabes, etc. etc. they are all human beings who want to be informed and i feel they are all my children).
in my opinion knowledge is a composite of this 'universal' western style knowledge and also the wisdom of yeshivas and madrasas, it is the popular culture and the behaviour of the man on the street, of the little kid drinking in what he sees on tv as if by iv.
OMG: Human being! IN MY
by vildemose on Sat Apr 17, 2010 11:06 AM PDTOMG: Human being! IN MY original version of last post, I said the same thing about the Yeshivas but I decided at the end not to mention Yeshiva.. I have great hopes and respect for that institution...
I'm not sure about the Madrassa/seminary in Iran but maybe Madrassas in Lebanon could be a good start.
vildemose thx
by humanbeing on Sat Apr 17, 2010 10:58 AM PDThearing from someone on this site that they think such trends might contribute to a positive change -- even peace! -- in ME is very very encouraging: on a bad day i think they are naive pipedreams in my head. if they could spread not just from universities and secular high schools, but infiltrate the yeshivas and madrasas on one hand, and nursery schools on the other, this would be even better.
DK: great
by vildemose on Sat Apr 17, 2010 10:29 AM PDTDK: great links.
Humanbeing: I'm so glad to hear the new trend. It could be the first step toward peace in the ME.
DK
by Rea on Sat Apr 17, 2010 04:47 AM PDT"In Short the Holocaust is Not Merely a property of Israeli or Jewish Collective Memory but that of Mankind as a whole."
True to the bone.
good luck dk
by humanbeing on Sat Apr 17, 2010 02:09 AM PDTgood luck with these cultural endeavours.
humanbeing Jaan Your welcome
by Darius Kadivar on Sat Apr 17, 2010 01:44 AM PDTGlad you found this feedbacks useful.
If I had money on the otherhand I would try and produce these interesting but alas unfinished projects which have not been fullfilled due to lack of investment or even interest by Hollwood Producers and Moguls :
Persia ? Ancient Persia's Virtual absence in Hollywood by Darius KADIVAR (Iranian.com)
He is Awake: Close Up on Cyrus Kar By Darius KADIVAR
XERXES: An Interview with Screen Writer Ren A. Hakim by Darius KADIVAR
It would change from some of these Revisionistic Hollywood Projects that have ridiculed Persian History and Culture:
The Persian Empire Strikes Back! by Darius KADIVAR
The Persian Empire Strikes Back Again ! by Darius KADIVAR
thanks dk
by humanbeing on Sat Apr 17, 2010 01:30 AM PDTthanks dk for all the info. i'm new here, so i was unfamiliar, e.g. with your blog on jews in the persian empire. my teenager has an equivalent on baccalaureat and for history they study on one hand 20th c. germany, with emphasis on the runup to fascist regime rather than a backgroundless pornographic collection of horror as they used to do, and on the other the persian and babylonian period, nebuchadnezzar, cyrus et al in detail, the text of cyrus' declaration in the bible vis a vis in archaeological findsm, everyday life and culture in what is today iraq and iran. you may be interested to know there is a sort of 'trend' now in talmudic studies at the universities here, where they are teaching and researching on the persian cultural and intellectual substrate in the bab. talmud and lit. contemp. to it. education to independent thinking, and to assessing information are the path to rapprochement and ought to replace incitement and ignorance all over the world.
if i had a lot of money, i would throw it all into such an endeavour; if i were a state leader, i would give it a very very high percentage of the budget, and if i were a world leader, i would sponsor it in other countries.
Never Forget Never Forgive ...
by Darius Kadivar on Sat Apr 17, 2010 12:23 AM PDTThe Holocaust !
That some may legitimately criticize Israel's policies and actions in the Middle East and there are many things to say about their behavior as a Colonialist ( and Not Racist) behavior towards the Palestinians.
slamming the holocaust card
NOTHING absolutely NOTHING in contemporary Human History ( except genocides- the word genocide is not to be taken out of context- such as in Rwanda or Ex Yougoslavia, the Red Kmers killing fields) can be compared to the Anti Nazi Laws and the Crimes of Purification that led to the Holocaust and the death of Not Just 6 Million Jews but also Gypsies, Mentally Challenged individuals, handicaps, political prisoners and homosexuals to name a few.
The Issues raised philisophically in regard to the Holocaust belong to mankinds Collective memory and consciousness. They cannot be dismissed however tempting whenever Israel's actions trigger controversy.
In Short the Holocaust is Not Merely a property of Israeli or Jewish Collective Memory but that of Mankind as a whole.
Recommended Readings:
Iranian Diaspora Intelligentsia Unite Against Islamic Republic's Holocaust Revisionism By DK
Banalization of history By DK
Recommended Watching:
Finkelstein Slamming the Tehran Holocaust Conference (Sahar TV):
HOLOCAUST A MYTH: Michelle Renouf on Iranian SAHAR TV
HISTORY FORUM:Jews in the Persian Empire a lecture by Dr. David Neiman
Very moving. Thank you for
by vildemose on Fri Apr 16, 2010 05:02 PM PDTVery moving. Thank you for sharing.