Fatemeh Keshavarz
Poetry
Poetry

“You See the Sparrow”

For one of the greatest poets of the twentieth Century,
Ahmad Shamlou

You are bold,
Shameless,
Demanding,
Anxious

You are curious,
Talkative,
Aggravating,
Eager to meet the neighbors

You are a nuisance,
A worrying type,
Obsessed with closed doors
Restless to stick your head in when they half open,
And talk to whoever is behind them.

Did you memorize entire dictionaries
when you needed words?
Did you stay up through the night
to live longer?
Did you wear glasses
to see better in the dark?

You catch that drop of rain,
That slips through the hole in the aged shingles.

You see the sparrow
Dashing around the blue above the yard,
Landing by mistake on the broken branch,
And falling
almost
into the pond below

You laugh at the silly ghost
Sticking his head in the door you forgot to close to stir up your fears
You don’t run!
Just laugh it out of your anxious dreams.

Yet the ghosts, the sparrows, the broken shingles
And the moments that fall through the cracks
They all shake you to the core
As quakes shake simple unsuspecting villages in Gujarat
You let them take you by storm.
Then savor the encounter,
The bruise,
The surprise in the echo of your own voice:
“It is never the same from one moment to the next!”

And you howl, simply howl like a wounded wolf
When you are angry

You are a poet,
You alter the world!

February 11, 2001

Poetry

“Abundance”

It has a ruthless clarity,
An uncompromising sense of direction
And a stunningly beautiful candidness
As persuasive as the sharp edge of a knife
On bare skin.
No partial measures,
No “almost there”s
No “just about”s.

No destinations that are kind of within reach.
You are there,
Or there is nowhere to go.

No occasional suns,
Half-cloudy skies.
It is an abundance of blue,
Or no air to breathe.

No whispering,
No cautiously worded statements of support.
You speak the shamelessly lucid idiom of love
In the loudest scream your vocal cords can afford,
You give all you are,
Or keep your nothing to yourself.

St. Louis, Feb. 12, 2001

Poetry

“Togetherness”

Stop
Every once in a while
And listen
To the flow of our togetherness
Against the unfolding time
The unfolding time
The silk garment
Cut to the contours of our naked longing
For whirling into one sun
One center of gravity
One well of clear thirst-quenching love
Where separation
Is a meager denial
Of the most perfect embrace
Love can invent.

Stop
Every once in a while
And listen
To the way
I cannot be without you.

St. Louis, February 6, 2001

Poetry

“A day”

A simple day it was
The day I wore in public
My thirst for being alive
Being happy
and true to the woman I am.

The day I wore myself on the outside
In public
Not like a snowsuit
For survival in the North Pole
Protecting my skin against frostbite
But like a carefully assembled necklace
Framing my face
And highlighting the spark in my eyes
A necklace that made a perfect bridge
Between the color of the new dress I wore
And my olive bright skin.

A simple day it was
Of the kind
That begin a new season.

January 2001 (after return from Iran)

Poetry

“Separation”

Your smile travels faster than light
A brilliant way to defy continents of separation.

It is not just the river and I…
Cyprus trees listen to the wind for your voice,
And golden ripe oranges long for your hands.

Alleyways unfold our desire for a walk.

How can you “not be” here
In so many different ways
So often?

Shiraz, January 10, 2001

Poetry

“The Long Walk Home”

Uncomplaining,
Acquainted with pain,
Simple.

Always returning from the market
Wrapped in her black chador
Carrying a bundle of something
Someone needs desperately.

Always leaving quietly
All footprints erased
Except clean glasses
Washed clothes
Piles of cooked rice
And a spotless sitting room.

Her forehead imprinted
With a constant headache
That will not give in to painkillers
(Not even the American kind).
Her fingers curled permanently
Around the wooden broom
With the determination of a lonely woman
Who expects little love.

That her kids have deserted school,
That her husband is an addict
Who accuses her of plotting to poison him,
Attract little surprise.
There she goes
Day after day
Expecting little love
And sweeping the sitting room
With broad, steady strokes
Her sun burnt face
The silent city of pain
Crumpled into a distorted map.

“Might you have American vitamins?”
My daughter looks so pale!”
I have learnt over the years
Not to be without some.
She beams like a victorious queen.

“Why don’t you take a taxi home today?”
I exploit the opportunity for contact
Slipping a folded bill into her pocket
With the bottle of vitamins.

As our eyes meet
We both know
She will buy a cream cake
And walk the long way home.

Shiraz, January 4, 2001

Poetry

Alleyways

Alleyways,
Stony echoes of anticipation
Left petrified
In between layers of time
Familiar as the lines on the palm of my hand.

Alleyways,
Vibrant with the indescribable pleasure
Of running into things
Totally known.
And new
As the shock of returning home.
The twisting and turning of memory
Unfolding before my feet.

Faces, faces, eyes
Cozy, deep, half-lit shops
Stacks of soap, sugar cubes
Boxes of cigarette, tea
And cookies
Cookies that hide entire childhoods
in one bite.

Alleyways,
The lifeline to the garden
Alive with fragrance of orange
The fragrance of orange
Spread in the air
The air
Saturated with sunshine and silent prayers
Emanating from
Half-burnt white candles – personal wishes aflame –
In God’s presence.

Shiraz, Dec.30, 2000

Poetry

“Shiraz”

Held up to gods
In the palm of a giant’s hands
A rare handcrafted marble cup
Overflowing with sunshine

Defined at the outer edges
With tall cypress trees
That line up at dawn reverently
To interpret the horizons
In their meticulous green thoughts

My city is, still,
That cup of sunshine
I can drink to the last drop
And be thirsty for more.

Shiraz, Dec.21, 2000

Poetry

Suddenly in St. Petersburg!

Inside:
Airtight rooms shut on fresh thought.
Revolving doors, designed to filter reality out
Of the sanctity of the convention space.
Much digging in shallow earth
For roots of authentic pasts
Much longing for seminal moments, formative facts
Much fury about who influenced who
Little desire to taste the mixed salad of cultures
To acknowledge the human craving for:
The food on the neighbor’s plate
The thirst for water of life
In distant wells of the far-off lands
The exchange, the change
The Heartbeat
The blood in the veins of history

Outside:
A dizzying fall into the black hollow of Mickey’s eyes
The Saint with bright yellow shoes
And the most famous round ears ever known.

On the purple bench facing the lake
Feeling anxiety-sick,
For the sun falling into the artificial lake.
Not sure where to place the breathing palm trees,
Their green branches dancing in real wind.
Or the delightful plump waiters
With heavy accents that contradicts
The overpowering smell of cheese burger and fried onions
Under the plastic ceiling of the purple café
Right out of the world wide web.

And suddenly in St. Petersburg!
In the museum
Hundreds of framed little spaces,
Each stretching the earth a few inches,
Beyond its current shape.
Vast, inviting, surreal moments:
Watches melting, violins draped in the sun
Puzzle pieces, oozing objects, running colors
Overlapping shapes that tease the simplicity of vision

All dancing on the melting surface of time
In Dali’s playful mind.

Still further out
Stiched at the far end to the pink sunset sky
The sea, the real sea
Wave upon wave of blue roaring freedom
At my feet
Empty shells, wet sand, and poetry
Meeting to celebrate the end of another day.

St. Petersburg, Nov.22, 2000

Poetry

A Heartbeat

If I had Dali’s paint brush
His teasing lines,
And his melting surface of time
I would let you look in that mirror
And see for yourself
How pregnant I am
With a simple heartbeat
Like a peaceful lake at sundown
Filled to the brim
With the sun.

You would look in that mirror
And see me standing in the kitchen
With triumphant greasy hands
My freshly baked loaf on one side
The jarful of raindrops and desire on the other
And not in the least bothered
By the million babies pulling at the hems of my skirt.

You would no longer ask why
I am so tender,
So strong,
And so able to pity
A world that has wiped
From its memory
The face of its mother
For the terror of facing old age.

In that melting mirror
You would see me sitting still
At sundown
When the fast is over
Facing the east
Marveling at the surge of love
From the earth beneath the prayer rug

You would see me
Giving birth every morning
To a lucid blue sky
With a sun near enough for you
To burn your finger
When pointing carelessly in its direction.

St. Louis, Nov. 30, 2000
Ramadan 3rd.