The old brick house hosted
three generations up to my mother.
In each corner it has etched a story on its old soul.
my favorite corner was an open space living room
with three tall walls and a dome-shaped ceiling
the third wall had a door to grandmother’s bedroom
with few little storages, covered by a small wooden door
low enough that grandmother could open while sitting
on the small velvet mattresses on the ground.
In one corner of the living room
there was an old red rug and a pale purple sitting pillow
that always looked like grandmother was sitting on it moments ago
and always had the shape of her body on it.
It was the summer of 1960 that I spent with her.
every morning she started her “manghal”
with few pieces of dry wood and coal
where she made a pot of hot tea
and toasted an egg with shell for me.
grandmother would walk graciously to the other end of the house
to the chicken coops and pick up a freshly laid egg for me.
eternal aroma and the taste of toasted egg,
fresh bread, freshly brewed tea with few pieces of rock sugar in it
and the sacred kindness and love on grandmother’s face.
lifelong delicacy!
it’s all you need to become a poet.
now after decades , I think of her
and imagine that house with the orchestra of
grandmother’s moves and voice,
in the still moments of my memory, exactly at the time
she opens the coop, and lets the chickens free in the garden
and the moment she poured my tea in the “fenjoon” and
picked up the egg from the “manghal” with ash on it.
….
Mahnaz Badihian is a poet and translator whose work has been published into several languages worldwide, including Persian, Turkish, and Malayalam. Her work has appeared in many literary magazines including Exiled ink! in the United Kingdom and in Marin Poetry Center Anthology amongst others. She attended the Iowa Writer’s workshop with a focus on international poetry while practicing as a dentist in Iowa City. Her publications include two volumes of poetry in Persian and a best-selling translation of Pablo Neruda’s Book of Questions into Persian. Her most recent publication is a critically acclaimed book of original English language poetry, From Zayandeh Rud to the Mississippi.
