Troop Suicides Surging | I Am Who Survived (a poem)

Image from the Eyes Wide Open Exhibit at San Francisco’s City Hall. It was displayed on 19 March 2012 to mark the 9th Anniversary of the War in Iraq.

“Suicides are surging among America's troops, averaging nearly one a day this year – the fastest pace in the nation's decade of war.

The 154 suicides for active-duty troops in the first 155 days of the year far outdistance the U.S. forces killed in action in Afghanistan – about 50 percent more – according to Pentagon statistics obtained by The Associated Press.”

-Robert Burns, Military Suicide Rate Surges To Nearly One Per Day This Year.


In April Nicholas Kristof documented the broader issue of veteran suicides.

“More than 6,500 veteran suicides are logged every year — more than the total number of soldiers killed in Afghanistan and Iraq combined since those wars began.”

This Poem, published by the Warrior Writers Project, hints why.


I AM WHO SURVIVED

I am a Christian
who survived 9 commandments but violated one
Thou shalt not kill
Plain and simple right?
It's more complicated than that
I followed my leaders with a long black crucifix in my hands
I loaded proverbs into magazines and shot them out of my crucifix
I carried bibles in my grenade pouches.
Forgive me father, for I have sinned
I have allowed bearers of false witness to burn you in an oil fire
I have allowed false idols to drop you on innocent victims, killing some, and disfiguring others
I have killed and allowed killing
I shall never kill again
I shall never get lost in the sandstorm of lies and shoot my way out.
Who survived?
I might have, but my faith didn't

by Cloy Richards

What you can do

Iraq Veterans Against War seek to address this issue through operation recovery.

AFSC Resource | The War Within: The Veteran Suicide Epidemic

Daughter of War | A Poem by Zahra

Mural Image: Hidden Children from Windows and Mirrors
Artists: Guilford College Community and Hannah Swenson, Courtney Mandeville and Layth Awartani

Daughter of War

I am a daughter of war.
When I was born,

The war was going on.
The sky was dark.
The houses were broken.
The weather was dusty.
The trees were seared.

There was no plant,
No awake human,
No tears in the eyes left.

The streets were covered
By dead human bodies;
The blood was like a river
In the street, house and everywhere.

I didn’t consider failure.
I was full of hope;
I could see

Green places, a blue sky,
Smiles on everyone’s face, tall buildings,
A book in my hand,

Sitting under the tree,
Studying with my parents and siblings,
In my dreams.

But

War never gave this chance.
War took my parents from us.
War took my book

And gave me burqa;
They put me in the jail of burqa.
War forbade me from going outside.

War changed my beautiful land
To the worst place in the world.
War changed our smiles to tears.

War made our dreams
Of going to school,
Freedom of speech,
To be just a dream.

But

I will try.
I will stand for my right.
I will break the silence.
I will show my power.
And I will bring peace
In my country once again.

I promised.

There will be no more war;
I will make my dreams come true.

Once again,
My homeland will be like heaven
And my people will be happy.

By Zahra

Zahra lives in a Taliban-controlled province in Afghanistan. She is the daughter of uneducated farmers who place great value on education for their children in the face of community and extended family disapproval. She is one of nine children able to pursue an education due to the ongoing support of her parents.

This poem is from the Afghan Women's Writing Project. To tell one's story is a human right.

A Commitment to Poetry | Afghan Women

A nice profile in the New York Times.

“Like many of the rural members of Mirman Baheer, a women’s literary society based in Kabul, the girl calls whenever she can, typically in secret. She reads her poems aloud to Amail, who transcribes them line by line. To conceal her poetry writing from her family, the girl relies on a pen name, Meena Muska. (Meena means “love” in the Pashto language; muska means “smile.”)

Meena lost her fiancé last year, when a land mine exploded. According to Pashtun tradition, she must marry one of his brothers, which she doesn’t want to do. She doesn’t dare protest directly, but reciting poetry to Amail allows her to speak out against her lot. When I asked how old she was, Meena responded in a proverb: “I am like a tulip in the desert. I die before I open, and the waves of desert breeze blow my petals away.” She wasn’t sure of her age but thought she was 17. “Because I am a girl, no one knows my birthday,” she said.”

Read the full article here.

Click here for more poems on Afghanistan 101.

The Destiny of a Leaf | A Poem by Qanbar Ali Tabesh

Qanbar Ali Tabesh was born in 1969 in Sangshanda village near Ghazni in Afghanistan. He fled from the war in Afghanistan to Iran, where he settled in the city of Qom. He has a B.A. in Persian Literature from Payam-e Nur University and a B.A. in Political Science from the Human Sciences Institute of Qom. He is currently writing his master's thesis in political science at Baqer ol-Olum University in Qom. He is a member of the editorial committee of Khatt-e Sevvom, the leading cultural and literary magazine of Afghan refugees in Iran. He has published three collections of poetry and one of literary criticism.



The Destiny of a Leaf

A man is not a bird
that he might make his home on any shore he flies to.
A man has the destiny of a leaf.
A leaf, when separated from the heights of its branch,
is trampled underfoot by passersby in the streets.

Qanbar Ali Tabesh

Qom, Iran, 28 June 1999
Link here

For more on the refugee experience, click here, and here.

Daughters of Afghanistan: Literary Voices of Change

Every one calls you to his own / I call you only to yourself --Rumi

"Classical Persian verse constantly evokes Afghanistan and its glorious history. Poets such as Rumi (from Balkh), Sanai (from Ghazni), and Jami (from Ghor) are still celebrated today. In the province of Balkh alone, there are several literary groups that serve poets and poetry enthusiasts alike, including the Partow Cultural Foundation, the Poets and Writers Organization of Balkh, and the Parwaz Literary Association. Zuzanna Olszewska, a translator of contemporary Afghan verse, writes that "poetry composition and recitation has been and continues to be the most highly prized and widely practiced art form among Afghans of all walks of life, both literate and illiterate." Honoring and emulating the traditions of their culture, young Afghans are establishing their own distinct voices.

Contemporary Afghan poetry reflects the country's sociopolitical circumstances. It echoes the anxieties and realities of a postwar society and the ambitions and aspirations of a generation that attempts to follow the world in the midst of a long, violent struggle colored by religious fanaticism and foreign occupation. Verse after verse, the quest for human dignity and long-enduring peace is heartfelt...."

Link to site

Tag: Poetry, Afghan voices

Afghan Women’s Writing Project | International Women’s Day

To Tell One’s Story is a Human Right

Writers and poets speak out, sharing their ideas for how Afghanistan, which ranks as one of the world’s most oppressed countries for women, should celebrate International Women’s Day on Thursday, March 8.

Click on the image above for featured stories and poems.

Celebrate with village women. Tell them about their rights, instead of celebrating in a big hotel and spending a lot of money. — Zarah A.

Give them a present. It can be a pen that costs just five afghanis. It is a great gift to reward their courage and to encourage their education. — Seema

A celebration in Afghanistan could be like caring for the soul. The best gift for a girl is to encourage and motivate her to grow her up to catch her wish, not to just put her under foot! — Zeinab N.

Establish some professional girls’ schools. Women need to be educated because they have to build a foundation in Afghanistan. The best gift for them is education. — Fatima

Let brave hearts fly and thank women for all that they have done in these years! — Masooma

Have meetings about the position of women in society and spread the culture of respect for women in Afghanistan. Men don’t want women to be part of society because they say society is not ready for women. But we can’t have this kind of society. — Narges

Men should show their respect and support for women. This is a good present. I hope the respect is not just for one day. It should be forever. — Kamilah

Write about women’s day. Let people know women are the most important gift that God gave to the world and we should respect them. Without women we would not live. Let people know what they wish for. They are like a beautiful butterfly that makes the world full of colors. — Sana S.

I hope every man with honest smile on his face will look at his wife and say, “my life is nothing without you.” — Fatima S.

Cluster | A Poem by Zein El-Amine

Zein El-Amine and Esther Iverem are two poets who read at the Windows and Mirrors opening last night in DC.



The picture shows Zein and Ann Northrup one of the muralists who shared her thoughts on art as activism and the goals of her work Mountain Kites.

This is one of the poems he read.


Cluster

“What we did was insane and monstrous.”
Head of IDF rocket unit, July 2006


On his last evening
Abu Ali walked home
between the rows of pine
that line his driveway,
settled in the shelter
of his grape arbor, rolled
a cigarette, was served tea
by his wife,
who was preparing
for the expected arrival
of unexpected guests.
He spotted a cluster
above his head
and tugged at it.
The stem snapped,
the concealed cylinder slipped,
its yellow ribbon followed,
fluttered down,
like a ticker tape.
A dull pop was heard.
A flash lit up the arbor –
Abu Ali’s last dispatch
to Marjiyoon’s children.

All throughout that month,
that followed the Summer Rain,
he had gathered
the kids wherever
he found them.
Showed them pictures,
of all the colors
that these things come in –
one next to a cell phone
to give them a sense
of scale. One of a boy,
sitting in a hospital,
seeming to kneel,
seeming to pray.

He held his lectures
under the cover of one tree
or another: under the fig
trees, with their fruit
in red August burst,
or under the sparse shelter
of a fruitless pomegranate.
The people of Marjiyoon
say, that on his last day,
he was seen near the cemetery
sitting in the sprawling shade
of the twisted branches of an olive tree.


by Zein El-Amine
Edited by Melissa Tuckey, July 29, 2011
link

Zein El-Amine, a contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus, has an MFA in poetry from the University of Maryland. His poems have been published by Folio, Beltway Quarterly, DC Poets Against the War Anthology, Penumbra, GYST, and Joybringer. His short stories have appeared in the Uno Mas and in Bound Off. His editorials and articles have appeared in Left Turn, The Afro American, The Washington Spark and The Washington Post. Melissa Tuckey is the poetry editor for FPIF and a board member of Split This Rock.

Bay-Peace Anthem | Luis Montoya & Egypt Claxton

"Mankind must put an end to war, or war will put an end to mankind"
- John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963



World Premiere - 2nd Annual
"If I Had A Trillion Dollars" Youth Film Festival

Saturday, April 14, 2012 - 6:00pm - 8:00pm

American Friends Service Committee and National Priorities Project are proud to invite you to the World Premiere of the 2nd Annual "If I Had A Trillion Dollars" Youth Film Festival.

The IHTD Youth Film Festival asks young people to speak out on the federal budget and asks them to consider:

The $1 trillion spent yearly on the U.S. military
The $1 trillion spent on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
The $1 trillion plus in tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans

Please join us for an evening of youth voices on the cost of war.

Check out the films here.

A Year of Secrets | A poem by Iris M. Feliciano

January 3, 2002
We board an aircraft in route to a secret airbase
With secret boxes with locks and secret codes
We consent

March 8, 2002
We transmit secret signals about enemies
and their secret hideaways for boots to storm
We certify

June 22, 2002
We find a secret stash of hash
and smoke beneath a rock
We approve

July 12, 2002
I am forced into a secret place
and robbed of my greatest secret
threatened never to tell
I succumb

September 4, 2002
We pack up secret photos of boys and girls
of dead camels and burnt homes
We lock them in a secret box with a secret code
We concede

November 17, 2002
We have secret meetings about
how to keep the secrets we were told
We board an aircraft with more secrets than any
box could hold.
We assent

December 7, 2002
My love kisses me
Once again we lay in our secret place
together, yet still so alone.
We don’t share any more secrets.
We defer.


Iris M. Feliciano is a Marine Corps veteran and a writer with the Warrior Writers Project , a national writing project for "veterans transforming their lives through art". She also works at a Chicago-based non-profit agency where she assists transitioning veterans with employment and supportive services.


Additional Resource: The Invisible War



THE INVISIBLE WAR is a groundbreaking investigative documentary about one of our country's most shameful and best kept secrets: the epidemic of rape within our US military. Today, a female soldier in Iraq and Afghanistan is more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire with the number of assaults in the last decade alone in the hundreds of thousands.

Postcards from Kabul | Nathalie Handal

I’m not that weak willow twisted by every breeze.
I’m an Afghan girl known to the world.

- Nadia Anjuman




In May 2011, poet Nathalie Handal was invited by the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa and the State Department to travel to Kabul, Afghanistan to participate in a literary tour, which also included National Book Award Finalist Joshua Ferris and essayist Christopher Merrill. While in Afghanistan, she taught a poetry workshop to young Afghan women students at Kabul University and participated in many literary dialogues with other poets from the country. The short film captures this unique poetic journey. Nathalie currently lives in New York City. From Bomblog.

Here is one of her poems she read…

Freedom

The Arab Revolt 2011

The story begins
with a song—
it’s stubborn,
breaks air
into history;
for a minute
it’s quiet
to allow everyone in,
and then it raises
to celebrate voices,
clears its throat,
says:
We will bury the smoke that blinds us,
plant our soul on every page,
we will divide our pain into towers
and fill our hands with rain,
we will arrive on time every day
to chase you away,
we will no longer be afraid
of what makes us shiver under the sun,
we will leave our names in every teahouse,
our messages at the bottom of every cup.

Light will no longer be illegal
nor will hope—
even the guards will count
the scars on their tongue
and prepare to heal,
even the children will keep
homeland in the mirror
and prepare to see,
even the women will turn
the fire inside the door
off, and prepare to live.

We will never whisper again.
There is evidence, there is evidence,
that now we can hear
the sounds that lift freedom
across a continent,
and say, Salaam to you,
welcome to my country.

by Nathalie Handal

From Guernica, A Magazine of Art and Politics

What I Will | Suheir Hammad

A poem of resistance.

Suheir Hammad was born in Amman, Jordan to Palestinian refugee parents on October 25, 1973. Her family immigrated to Brooklyn NY when she was five years old. She is the author of three poetry collections and has written and performed with the Def Poetry Jam on Broadway hosted by Russell Simmons. Check out this tribute to her father. She also starred in the 2008 Cannes official selection film Salt of This Sea.

This recording is from a 9 December show in Philadelphia hosted by Al-Bustan Seeds of Culture. The center is dedicated to presenting and teaching the Arabic language, arts, and culture.






What I Will
by Suheir Hammad

I will not
dance to your war
drum. I will
not lend my soul nor
my bones to your war
drum. I will
not dance to your
beating. I know that beat.
It is lifeless. I know
intimately that skin
you are hitting. It
was alive once
hunted stolen
stretched. I will
not dance to your drummed
up war. I will not pop
spin beak for you. I
will not hate for you or
even hate you. I will
not kill for you. Especially
I will not die
for you. I will not mourn
the dead with murder nor
suicide. I will not side
with you nor dance to bombs
because everyone else is
dancing. Everyone can be
wrong. Life is a right not
collateral or casual. I
will not forget where
I come from. I
will craft my own drum. Gather my beloved
near and our chanting
will be dancing. Our
humming will be drumming. I
will not be played. I
will not lend my name
nor my rhythm to your
beat. I will dance
and resist and dance and
persist and dance. This heartbeat is louder than
death. Your war drum ain’t
louder than this breath.

Here is the Def Poetry version from 2007.

The End and the Beginning | Wislawa Szymborska

After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won’t
straighten themselves up, after all.

Someone has to push the rubble
to the sides of the road,
so the corpse-laden wagons
can pass.

Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.

Someone must drag in a girder
to prop up a wall.
Someone must glaze a window,
rehang a door.

Photogenic it’s not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.

Again we’ll need bridges
and new railway stations.
Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.

Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls how it was.
Someone listens
and nods with unsevered head.
Yet others milling about
already find it dull.

From behind the bush
sometimes someone still unearths
rust-eaten arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass which has overgrown
causes and effects,
someone must be stretched out,
blade of grass in his mouth,
gazing at the clouds.


— Wislawa Szymborska
(translated from the Polish by Joanna Trzeciak)

Wislawa Szymborska, a Polish poet who writes about ordinary and extraordinary moments, won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1996.

A Poem as Tribute | Taha Mohammed Ali

Taha Muhammad Ali died on Sunday in Nazareth. He was born in the Galilee village of Saffuriya in 1931.*

His poetry followed the experiences of Palestinians living in Israel, and Palestinian refugees around the world.

The beauty of this poem, on the nature of revenge and compassion, is universal. Revealing the power of love to heal, restore, and resolve conflict.

REVENGE

At times … I wish
I could meet in a duel
the man who killed my father
and razed our home,
expelling me
into
a narrow country.
And if he killed me,
I’d rest at last,
and if I were ready—
I would take my revenge!

*

But if it came to light,
when my rival appeared,
that he had a mother
waiting for him,
or a father who’d put
his right hand over
the heart’s place in his chest
whenever his son was late
even by just a quarter-hour
for a meeting they’d set—
then I would not kill him,
even if I could.

*

Likewise … I
would not murder him
if it were soon made clear
that he had a brother or sisters
who loved him and constantly longed to see him.
Or if he had a wife to greet him
and children who
couldn’t bear his absence
and whom his gifts would thrill.
Or if he had
friends or companions,
neighbors he knew
or allies from prison
or a hospital room,
or classmates from his school …
asking about him
and sending him regards.

*

But if he turned
out to be on his own—
cut off like a branch from a tree—
without a mother or father,
with neither a brother nor sister,
wifeless, without a child,
and without kin or neighbors or friends,
colleagues or companions,
then I’d add not a thing to his pain
within that aloneness—
not the torment of death,
and not the sorrow of passing away.
Instead I’d be content
to ignore him when I passed him by
on the street—as I
convinced myself
that paying him no attention
in itself was a kind of revenge.

Nazareth
April 15, 2006

© 2006 by Taha Muhammad Ali. English translation and copyright 2006 by Peter Cole, Yahya Hijazi, and Gabriel Levin.

To learn more click here.

* His family fled to Lebanon with most of the inhabitants of his village during the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. Unable to return to his home he moved to the nearby city of Nazareth where he lived and worked in a souvenir shop throughout his life as an Israeli citizen.

My first namaz | A Poem by Meena

During the monsoons in Pakistan,
the news of my grandmother’s death
made our lives rainier, showing me
my father’s tears for the first time.
I wanted to take his pain away
But didn’t know how.

After the long day of the funeral,
he slept on a mattress.
sitting close to him,
I crossed my legs
My hands touched his forehead;
I put my head on his.
He woke up nervous
as if he did not know where he was.
How is my love doing?
he asked and went to pray
for his mother’s soul.
I decided, at age six,
I was old enough to pray with him
I said,
God will listen to me more.

He spread out two green prayer rugs
We stood facing the qiblah
he took my small hands in his large ones
and put the right on the left,
close to my chest.
Repeat after me, he said.

Now we both sat in Sajda,
placing our foreheads on the rug.
His head was still on the rug
when I stole a glance at him.
He looked back, reminding me
that I was not supposed to do that.
Looking at the peace on his face,
though,
Was probably worth the sin.



~ Meena was born in Kabul but spent much of her early childhood as a refugee living in Peshawar. She says her goal, once she finishes her education, is to work to help Afghan women gain financial independence, education and political freedom.

Notes
Qiblah: a niche which indicates the direction Muslims should face during prayer
Sajda: prostration in worship

From the Afghan Women’s Writing Project
“To tell one’s story is a human right.”

The Sewing Machine | Aman Mirzai (Poem)

Aman Mirzai was born in Mashhad, Iran, in 1985, to a family of refugees from Mazar-e Sharif in Afghanistan. He has been writing poetry for seven years, and has won awards in many nationwide poetry competitions in Iran. He has published one collection of poetry, Giah-e Sukhte [The Burnt Plant].

He is currently a student of public relations in Mashhad, and an active member of the Dorr-e Dari Cultural Center, the foremost literary organization among Afghan refugees in Mashhad.




The Sewing Machine

The sewing machine’s quiet hum
was my mother’s sad song.
At my father’s stall
it was her peasant trousers
that could send me to school
answer the landlord
and buy medicine.
My sister Marzieh, whose illness nobody understands,
and cannot be cured even in the shrine,
coughs continuously
like the sewing machine’s needle
and the softness of her bones
only feeds the earth’s lust.
Mother is the needle’s thread:
with Marzieh’s every cough,
with every breath her heartstrings rend.
Father doesn’t close his stall even in the rain
and I, in a place where nobody goes,
talk to myself.
The clever people in the newspapers
write articles about us,
while my countrymen
have forgotten the pleasures of the spring festival of Mazar.
Mother is the sewing machine’s foot at night:
she trembles.
Father is the doorframe
closed into himself.
A pot of bitter tea;
in the photo album Marzieh gently laughs
and I think about everything.




To read more click here.
Click here for new writing from Afghanistan: Writing from Afghanistan

The View from Within | Writing From Afghanistan

Guest Editor: Anders Widmark

In a discussion at the House of Culture in Stockholm just over a week ago, the Afghan writer Atiq Rahimi, having summarized the last three decades of Afghan history, concluded laconically that the present state was: “un chaos total”—a total chaos. Rahimi is far from alone in his assessment, but he is unusual in that he speaks to the situation as an Afghan, rather than an outside observer. It is the “chaos” this issue has tried to put in words—this time voiced from within.

From within I say, and this is important. Much of what is said and written about Afghanistan in the West today is still tainted by an outside perspective on the situation—a narrative that keeps repeating and reformulating earlier misconceptions and generalizations. With regard to the ongoing conflict, it is completely incomprehensible to me, even as a layman in the field, that policy-makers on Afghanistan have failed so utterly in understanding this country after a decade of interference. No one seems to listen to the people. No one seems to hear what they are saying or read what they are writing.

Contemporary Afghan literature rests upon a rich heritage of both oral and written traditions. The two major languages of Afghanistan, Pashto and Dari, with approximately sixty million speakers altogether (including those outside Afghanistan), possess a wealth of literature, unfortunately mostly unstudied, marginalized, and known to few. Hopefully, this issue on Afghan writing will help to introduce its treasures to a broader public.

Talking about Afghan literature, you are often forced into a discussion on politics. In a “poeticized community” such as Afghanistan, much of what is written, especially poetry, is in one way or another related to politics; not necessarily being political or ideological, but politicized to various degrees. This will be seen clearly in the texts selected for this issue. Much of the country’s history is channeled through literature; in both written and oral literature, in the canonical as well as in the noncanonical, in the past and in the present. When one considering the nature of poetry and fiction produced over the last three decades of war and conflict this becomes clear. What is also interesting and can be said to epitomize Afghan literature of today, is its high degree of responsiveness and immediacy—in many other literatures a national trauma often demands some sort of “incubation period” before the topic can be processed; in Afghanistan, traumas are attacked by the pen simultaneously as they occur. “The Idol’s Dust” by Zalmay Babakohi, as an example, was written only a month after the destruction of the Bamiyan statues in March 2001.

To finish the introduction click here.

Full Issue: Writing from Afghanistan

Fatana Jahangir Ahrary | Two Poems

Peace

Like an enervated man
Gasping for air
Like a wounded bird
Searching for remedy
Like a guilty conscience
Seeking some virtue
Like a hungry child
Craving some sustenance
Like a thirsty creature
Yearning for some water
I want some serenity
I need some harmony
I am waiting for some tranquility
Come please Come
Peace Peace Peace


Promise

Remember you promised
When the birds fly back home
When the winter is gone
When the spring sun shines again
You will be here
You will be back
Winter is gone
Birds are back home
Spring sun is shining
But.........
You are not here
You are not back

by: Fatana Jahangir Ahrary



Working Note: I write poems mostly in Dari, but once in a while I write English. This is when I think in English. I do not translate my English poems to Dari or vice versa. I started writing poetry since I was in 4th grade but only in Dari and of course at that age no one considered it poetry. I taught myself English at home by myself and never took any classes to learn English. I started writing in English when I was 26 or 27 years old.

Bio: I was 21 years old when I came to USA. I am 40 years old now and work as a supervisor for Autosterade International of Virginia. I lived in New York for 16 years. My husband was killed in a robbery 14 years ago in New York. I have two daughters who are both in college. I now live in Virginia.

Ways to Count the Dead | Poem by Persis M. Karim

Ways to Count the Dead

“Keeping track of the Iraqi death toll isn’t the job of the United States,” a student said, “and besides, how would we count the dead?”

Take their limbs strewn about the streets—
multiply by a thousand and one.

Ask everyone in Baghdad who has lost
a brother. Cousin. Sister. Child—to speak
their name in a recorder.

Go to every school, stand
at the front of the class, take roll;
for every empty desk, at least two dead.

Find every shop that sells cigarettes—
ask how many more cartons they’ve sold this year.

Go to the bus station and buy ten tickets—
offer them free to anyone who wants to leave.

Go see the coffin-maker. Ask how much
cedar and pine he’s ordered this month.

The dead don’t require much. They don’t speak
in numbers or tongues, they lie silent

waiting—to be counted.

-Persis M. Karim



Persis M. Karim teaches literature and creative writing at San Jose State University. She is the editor and contributing poet to Let Me Tell You Where I've Been: New Writing by Women of the Iranian Diaspora (2006). Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary journals including Caesura, Alimentum, Di-verse-city, HeartLodge, and Ravingdove.org. She is currently working on a manuscript of poems, "Ways to Count the Dead".

For more poems visit Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here.

Named for a tenth-century poet and revolutionary who lived in what is now Iraq, Al-Mutanabbi Street in Baghdad was the center of the city’s intellectual and literary life. It was home to booksellers, stationery stores, antiquarian bookstores, and cafes as famous for the ideas that flowed freely as for their pungent coffee.

Earth | Partaw Naderi

Earth

The earth opens her warm arms
to embrace me
The earth is my mother
She understands the sorrow
of my wandering

My wandering
is an old crow
that conquers
the very top of an aspen
a thousand times a day

Perhaps life is a crow
that each dawn
dips its blackened beak
in the holy well of the sun

Perhaps life is a crow
that takes flight with Satan’s wings

Perhaps life is Satan himself
awakening a wicked man to murder

Perhaps life is the grief-stricken earth
who has opened up her bloodied arms to me

And here I give thanks
on the brink of ‘victory’

By Partaw Naderi


*Translated by Sarah Maguire for the VOICES | Education Project

Partaw Naderi was born in Badakhshan in northern Afghanistan, in 1953. Steeped in the rich traditions of Persian poetry, his bold innovations have led him to be regarded as one of the leading modernist poets in Afghanistan. He studied in his birthplace and graduated from the Faculty of Sciences at Kabul University in 1354 [1976]. He was imprisoned in the notorious Pul-e-Charki prison by the Soviet-backed regime for three years in the 1970s shortly after he’d begun to write poetry. He is now widely regarded as one of the leading modernist poets in Afghanistan, the lyrical intensity of his work coupled with his bold use of free verse distinguishing him as a highly original and important poet. After years in exile he recently returned to live in Kabul where he is president of Afghan PEN.

Like a Desert Flower | Poetry

Like a desert flower waiting for rain,
like a river-bank thirsting for the touch of pitchers,
like the dawn
longing for light;
and like a house,
like a house in ruins for want of a woman -
the exhausted ones of our times
need a moment to breathe,
need a moment to sleep,
in the arms of peace, in the arms of peace.

by Parween Faiz Zadah Malaal


Parween Faiz Zadah Malaal, born in 1957 in southern Afghanistan, began her career by writing for Tolo-e-Afghan, the daily paper in Kandahar. She also worked for Radio Afghanistan. She recently moved to Peshawar, where she has published short stories and three collections of poetry.

*From the Poetry Translation Centre.

The original Da Khazaan Tilayee Ploona (The Golden Footsteps of Autumn), published in Peshawar