After the silence of firing squads
Still it burns in our hearts
And we carry their corpses
On our broken backs.
I want to turn this death into life.
How many companions,
Who in these years of defeat and execution
Created life from an embryo?
I am talking about the children of prison and exile:
Cheshmeh, Roza, and Sulmaz.(1)
I want to turn this death into life
That like a jug of water
Becomes filled with the freshness of Cheshmeh,
And like a red rose
Blooms from the lips of Roza,
And like the word “sulmaz”
Becomes evergreen.
I will sift, grind, and soften this death,
Until the children of prison and exile
Mold it into playdough.
I am calling you,
O newborns of years of pain,
The crocodiles in your painting
Have no teeth,
Because the names of their friends
Never crossed their lips.
I want to turn this death into a poem,
That can be read like magic
When the corpse of a butterfly
Carried by ants
Makes you remember the dead ones.
I want to turn this death into life.
February 15, 1986
1. These names respectively mean: “spring”, “rose” and “everlasting”.
The English version of this poem was first published in my collection of poems Muddy Shoes (Beyond Baroque Books, 1999) and then in an anthology After Shocks: The poetry of Recovery (Sante Lucia Books 2008) edited by Tom Lombardo.
