Philosophers of Filth

My son wakes up screaming every morning at 4:30 am.  After a pat on the head and tucking back in under the covers, he’s out again and I get back in bed, stare at the clock and try to will myself to sleep. Eventually I give up and lie awake worrying about money.  The other morning was a rare exception – Simon slept through his wakeup call. I, however, awoke as usual and, having nothing better to do, started thinking about ‘Eshqi and his utopian vision of mob rule.  I felt I’d been too harsh on him. He wasn’t crazy,  just really angry. He also had the disadvantage of being in his early twenties when he composed that piece.  I can only imagine all the crap I would have written had the internet existed in any usable form when I was young and stupid.

‘Eshqi was far from stupid. His writing is clear-eyed and straight forward. He was aware of the absurdity of his ideas yet felt no compulsion to water down the severity of his vision. The essay sounds almost like Nietzsche in tone, with lots of “O Man” this and “O Nation” that.  And he wasn’t the only one to think in these extremes, as just a few years earlier, a band of really ticked off nationalists had formed The Punishment Committee (I love that band!) with the intent of killing off the enemies of the Iranian nation, however they might be defined. They managed to bag a few before being sent up the river.  Stories like these drive home the despair felt by Iranian nationalists who had seen all the advances made during the Constitutional Revolution a decade before reversed by the onslaught of WWI and foreign machinations. It’s depressing to think about, frankly, and I got out of bed in a foul mood that morning.

Anyway, on with the story…

[The second article opens with another allegorical discussion of the need for winding watches and keeping the gears of machinery clean and running smoothly. Also, the necessity of bathing regularly, so our bodies are not "polluted with germs, sweat, and filth." ]

“It is the same with the public “body”. Every society that allows filth to accumulate in the machinery of its laws, clogging the gears completely or making it work in a way other than originally intended without being repaired, eventually encounters elements in the body politic which are the equivalent of those noxious germs on the body of a person who has not bathed in three weeks.

What elements are these? These enemies of civil rights, of the public interest? Enemies of the people’s happiness, of their comfort, their well-being? These are the people to whom I, in my personal notes, have given the name “Philosophers of Filth.”

[...] The Philosophers of Filth are those elements who, as a result of greed and malice, consider all human kindness to be nothing but a figment of the imagination or, at best, a tool for deception.

They consider mercy a weakness of spirit or a symptom of a trembling heart. To them, compassion is nothing but a defect in the natural disposition of the compassionate person. [...] If this sort of Philosopher of Filth saw a family in the wilderness, a mother and five or six kids,  who had only fifteen kilograms [five man] of flour for their monthly provisions and for whom no hope of meeting their needs for the next month could be seen…why, what would restrain this Philosopher from taking those fifteen kilograms of flour by force for himself? It is certain that through these actions, the family would be dead from hunger in a few days. The Philosopher of Filth would laugh at their deaths and not regret taking that flour in the least.

The Philosopher of Filth would consider such a theft a highly rational act, since it did not endanger his own well-being at all!

[...] The great Philosophers of Filth, those we call “experienced”, are those who, when they occupy positions of authority in a government, sell off all the nation’s resources to foreigners in order to enrich themselves.  If [Prime Minister] Vosuq al-Dawleh sold Iran, there is no doubt he would be considered one of the great philosophers of his time! Because Vosuq al-Dawleh laughs in the face of mercy, honesty and integrity.

The Philosophers of Filth will be sacrificed in the Festival of Blood.

[More after the break...]

A Festival of Blood, or, It Sounded Like A Good Idea At The Time

So I’ve come upon a document which is either a perfect example of irony or the work of a slightly deranged man. Could be both, I suppose.  The author is the Iranian poet/playwright/essayist Mirzadah ‘Eshqi (1893-1924), a younger contemporary of Bahar’s whose literary attacks on the government eventually resulted in his assassination, apparently by agents of Reza Khan (later Reza Shah Pahlavi). His poetry is clever and often more daring than Bahar’s, if less technically proficient. He also lacked Bahar’s range, confining himself almost solely to the plight of contemporary Iran.

Around about 1922, furious over the collapse of the democratic movement following the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1911, ‘Eshqi composed a series of articles in his paper “Twentieth Century” (Qarn-e Bistom) under the title “Festival of Blood” (‘Ayd-e Khun).   The opening passages stress that laws at their conception are pure and just, but as they are administered by fallible human beings, eventually they become corrupted and twisted to the petty ends of the very individuals who have been entrusted with upholding them. He uses the analogy of someone who owns a hunting rifle or a watch; eventually, through use, the tool becomes worn down, and requires regular attention and maintenance to ensure that it functions properly. The same is true, he claims, for the law. Five days of each year should be set aside for repairing and cleansing the law, just as one might do with one’s own home.

Fair enough, you might be thinking, but what exactly does this entail? Well..I’ll let ‘Eshqi explain:

“I would like these several days (Festival of Blood) to supersede all other holidays and recreational pursuits of human society, for such pastimes have no real consequence other than personal amusement, while this Festival would provide benefits of immeasurable value. In this belief and by means of these writings, I hereby suggest the five days of the Festival of Blood to the world at large, following this pattern:

From the first to the fifth day of the first month of summer, the general public, each in their own clime, country, city, town, or tribe shall come out of their houses dressed in their best clothes and marked by a scarlet sash to gather in the town square. Then, after the recitation of odes composed specially for the Festival of Blood, they shall hasten to the houses of people who, during the past year, were in positions of authority and responsible of the upkeep of the law but had betrayed society, escaping prosecution only because the courts lacked the power to interfere or for some other reason. ٌWithout hesitation, they should burn down their houses and tear them limb from limb.

In the name of God – what recreation could be better than this?”

[More to come! The fun's just starting!]

The Poet’s Heart

Once again lacking the energy to produce something new, I thought I’d share excerpts from an essay by Bahar that I’m translating.  It’s remarkable in several aspects. First, at the time of writing (early 1920’s), essays in general, and particularly those expressing the author’s inner feelings, were a rarity in Persian letters. Second, it is part of Bahar’s “Anonymous” series, which includes some of his most famous and most popular poems. The Pigeon poem from the earlier post is one of this series. Almost all of the anonymous material includes innovations in form and content that Bahar may have been slightly uncomfortable with and therefore chose to hide his identity. Not very well, it turns out, since they were published in his own newspaper, for the most part. One of the joys of studying the work of Bahar is that he seemingly wrote down everything he thought. So, here’s some of the opening portion of the essay.

(Standard disclaimer: this is a first draft of the translation. Excuse the awkward English. )

The Poet’s Heart

How fortunate that my heart is hard like flint; I am not bothered by its complaining about the harshness of daily life.

I don’t know if my heart is the heart of a child, or if a child possesses a poet’s heart…

I suspect that all hearts are two forms made one. Thus, a child’s heart is uniform throughout. Later, the heart begins to change and differentiate itself. It grows larger, thicker, and harder, is less ready to believe, has fewer loves and rarely speaks the truth. It takes pleasure in vengeance and relishes revealing other people’s secrets, as if they were a fine wine. It has an immense patience for pointless chatter full of big words. It wishes courage on others, but claims the outcome for itself. It does not grieve over abuse received and has no qualms about lashing out at others. It prefers money over everything, even love itself. Their hearts become so big that they encompass millions of gold coins and the desire for millions more!

These hearts are truly great and, in my opinion, very useful; it is my belief that hearts such as these (of which I am deprived) are a natural gift.

[...]

I was not afflicted with the overwhelming grief which is the sign of deep affection, nor was I swept away by great joy. Rather, I was entwined in a placid, thoughtful silence, both painful and pleasurable. I was like a half-concious patient, whose deep wounds had been skillfully treated and who has been reassured he shall not die.

[...]

Why do I find nothing pleasing?

Why do I accept nothing unreservedly on faith?

Why can I accept nothing as true?

Why do I consider myself and all created things to be transient, unworthy, laughable, even impossible?

Why is it that with money, I care as little about acquiring it as I do about having it taken from me?

Why am I so quick to anger and forgive, and why does it take me so long to forget?

Why does every little happenstance linger in the depths of my heart, and why do I not seek revenge?

And in the end, why do I mock myself so?

Why have I drowned in myself rather than finding solace?

Why do I flee from affectations, and why does leisure and pleasure bore me so?

Why am I so vexed by all the talking and having to listen to all the talking? If I am lazy, then why do I have no trouble with all my writing and reading and rushing to and fro?

[...]

At times I think perhaps this is a sign that my capacity to love has reached its end. But then I see my children and family and feel a love akin to madness; I would give my life for theirs.

[...]

Regarding my writings, I view them with suspicion which grows with public approval. I consider them acceptable only with great caution. I am as unwilling to read my poems before the public as I am willing to hear the people’s own nonsensical works! I am only satisfied with praise for my poetry or prose which comes in my absence, but even then I don’t consider it to be true.

[...]

I imagine that when God created the poet, he left something out of his heart. When the poet arose, God saw that he was deficient, so He gave the poet a gift that his heart would not be broken and he would be somewhat prepared for life. That gift was the poetic temperment.

Iran in the news

I’ve resisted up till now writing about Iranian politics and the recent protests because A: there are only so many hours in a day and B: a lot of other people are doing it already, many of them much better qualified than I to comment. But it really is fascinating and important, so in lieu of opinion, here are some links to other coverage, all in English. Perhaps I’ll eventually translate a recent essay from the press

Tehran 24 Pictures of Tehran in general and protests as they happen.

Tehran Bureau

Not long ago, this was a blog. It’s now been absorbed by PBS, apparently, and offers headlines and commentary. Also, video footage, arts and culture, etc. Wow, I hadn’t looked at the actual site in a while, just the feed on my news reader. The commentary is very interesting and well-informed with a pro-reform bias. The writers are much more familiar with the inner workings of the government than your typical white-guy-with-an-MA-in-Middle East Studies (hi, Mom!) pundit and like to delve into subjects ignored by US media. Probably the best English-language resource out there.

The Lede Though not focused on Iran specifically, The Lede is the New York Times’ breaking-story blog and did a great job covering the post-election riots.

Daily Dish If you like your reporting tinged with mawkish sentiment, Andrew Sullivan follows events in Iran pretty closely, at least as they pertain to overthrowing the government.

Mehr News Agency A relatively new news agency, Mehr News has been cited frequently in the foreign press. Like all news outlets in Iran, they make some claim to independence from the government.  I haven’t looked into it but it pays to be skeptical of such claims. Their English site is not bad, though like all the others, it carries only a portion of the Persian content.

I’ll add more as I think of them. YouTube is the hot spot for posting videos from the protests, so I’ll link to those as they appear. Although I’ll warn you now, watching old ladies being pummeled by baton-wielding thugs is really depressing.

Autumn. It sucks.

Even if the season is trying to fool us with this summer heat, Fall is coming and with it, the chance to mope around with some grumpy poets. Bahar loved to  write poetry at the brink of seasons; triumphal odes to Spring and more reflective (i.e., grumpy) poems as his beloved garden started to droop.

But those poems are long and complicated and I’m a busy man, so here’s a modern piece by Forugh Farrokhzad.  She was a fascinating and short-lived figure, famous for her poetry and notorious for her independent lifestyle as a divorcee in 1950’s Iran. Here’s a website devoted to her life and work, chock full of translations, photos, and even audio of the poet reading.

This is the shi’r-e naw, “new poetry”, of the twentieth century and onward which abandoned the strictures of classical form and content and whole-heartedly embraced blank verse and Western styles. Honestly, I have little practice with it and this is my first attempt at translating the style.

“Autumn”

I close two eyes full of pain

against Nature’s bewitching face

so that my fevered gaze does not rest upon

these vistas of regret and mourning.

Autumn, dust stained traveller,

What is it you hide amongst your robes?

What riches do you offer this world,

other than leaves, withered and dying?

To Book or Not to Book

Cushing Academy, a swanky private school in northern Massachusetts, is ridding itself of books. As boston.com explains , it’s a question of technology not censorship:

“When I look at books, I see an outdated technology, like scrolls before books,’’ said James Tracy, headmaster of Cushing and chief promoter of the bookless campus. “This isn’t ‘Fahrenheit 451’ [the 1953 Ray Bradbury novel in which books are banned]. We’re not discouraging students from reading. We see this as a natural way to shape emerging trends and optimize technology.’’

The move is part of an overhaul of the entire library. The idea of transforming traditional libraries into space-age “learning centers” is not new. Library architects have long strived to make libraries more congenial to the patrons, rather than just storage spaces for more books. It’s important to have somewhere comfy to read those books you’ve managed to locate. Widener Library is a good example of the exact opposite of this trend. To the newcomer, our library is “unfriendly,” “confusing,” “a Cretan Labyrinth in which one expects to be assaulted by the monstrous Minotaur,” and, despite massive renovations, this is still more or less true (except for the Minotaur; he’s quite friendly).  So I applaud the Academy’s efforts to create a more inviting work space for the patrons. Even the mention of their new “$12,000 cappuccino machine” (which I expect was included in the hope that certain readers will shake their fists and holler “Why, those good-fur-nothin’ high-falutin’ fancy-pants bigshots”) doesn’t bother me; no one can deny the inseparable bond between research and caffeine.
The inclusion of wide-screen TVs “that will project data from the Internet” begins to stretch credulity. This sort of thing is a sign of large budgets that must be spent. As a government employee, I worked in an office that had gobs of money thrown at it following 9/11 and one of the first moves was to buy some of those damn TVs for the walls. The idea, allegedly, was to create a similar sort of space to the “learning center” with the idea that certain vital information, should it ever appear, would be broadcast on these screens to form a “collaborative environment.” In reality, they just wanted to look like those CIS shows where supermodels solve crimes while bathed in indirect blue lighting. Add to this the sort of “data from the internet” that a high school student would find interesting and you move from useless to potentially litigious.
But the real story here is the removal of all the books. Understandably, the librarian is upset having been stripped of the tools of her profession and made Head Babysitter for a bunch of caffeine-stoked wireheads trying to download Jay Z mp3’s. But while this all strikes me as indulging in technological hysteria, I find the primary argument against losing the books equally silly, if not downright fetishistic:

“They worry about an environment where students can no longer browse rows of voluptuous books, replete with glossy photographs, intricate maps, and pages dog-eared by generations of students….
“I love books. I’ve grown up with them, and there’s something lost when they’re virtual. There’s a sensual side to them – the smell, the feel, the physicality of a book is something really special.’’

I’ve heard similar slightly creepy gushing from NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” program on Amazon’s electronic book, the Kindle (which, not surprisingly, is what Cushing Academy is using to replace their books : eighteen Kindles. I wonder how long you get to check them out?). In response to Jacob Weisberg’s article in Slate  , “How the Kindle will change the world,” several concerned citizens called in to talk about how much they loved to touch books (also, one REALLY concerned citizen, if you know what I mean, warned us that the Kindle was a government conspiracy to brainwash us, “Like in that book, Animal Farm.” I don’t know what he’s worried about – I just read Animal Farm on my Kindle and it was really cute. What a happy ending!). They also shared their memories of “sniffing” books, all while “getting warm” next to them in bed.
Take a cold shower, people! In my profession, one acquires an attitude toward books akin to how a veterinarian who works at an animal shelter feels about kittens. Yes, they are wonderful creations, we love them dearly and want to take them all home, but I’m afraid some of them are going to have to go. Not all books are created equal and in fact, few of them are created with any sort of skill or artistic endeavour at all. I mean, really, when was the last time you bought or even read a well-made leather-bound book? And if you did happen to pull an old tome off the shelf, what is that smell you found so charming? Mold spores. Though we may like to think of books as living entities, companions and whatnot, they are more like decaying corpses. I have books in front of me right now which are essentially disinterred remains whose rotting pages are held together with bandages. Working with them will leave me snot-nosed and teary-eyed, my clothes and hands streaked with a pestilent brown powder that clings to whatever it touches and, I kid you not, burns your skin. The pages will threaten to fall apart in my hands and the text will have been rendered illegible by wormholes. Yes, the charming bookworm exists, chewing through paper and leather like a maggot through flesh. And these texts are not terribly old, maybe a little over 100 years. The library has entire departments devoted to trying to stop the decay of books, including strike teams for emergency response and a freezer for preserving that copy of The Great Gatsby you dropped in the pool. Some books are Dead On Arrival, coming straight from the publisher with cheap bindings unglued, pages falling out, text smeared across the page. And let’s face it, some books just shouldn’t have been written in the first place. So let’s not grow too effusive in our worship of the common book. It could benefit from some improvements. Granted, modern books with their acid-free paper and whatnot are more durable than those lovely leather volumes but eventually the grease from your needy fingers and the damp heat of summer will collude to turn your precious books to mush.

No, the real shame of trying to create a bookless library is that you instantly confine yourself only to those books which are available electronically. I know, it seems like Amazon has every book in the world, but it’s far from true. While their goal “to have every book ever printed, in every language, available on Kindle” is admirable, at 300,000 titles, they’ve got a long way to go. A quick search for anything by the famed Persianist E.G. Browne came up blank in the Kindle library, while Steve Aylett, the brilliantly insane British, um, author is represented only by his latest title, Lint (a mock-biography that I highly recommend), while none of his earlier and essential works like Slaughtermatic or Fain the Sorcerer are available. I mean, come on, no Slaughtermatic? Losers. If there is one book that over-privileged New England kids need to read, that’s it. I’m reminded of my disappointment when I finally made my foray into Itunes only to discover that not only could I not find recent imports (hello, Comsat Angels back catalog), but I couldn’t even get a copy of Peter Gabriel’s “So”. In essence, the bookless library will be buying their books from a single vendor and a vendor with whom they have no rapport. For our Persian collection alone (none of which, I imagine, will ever be available on Kindle), I work with three different vendors, each specializing in a different realm. If there’s a book we need, I ask them to find it and they often go to great lengths to do so. Our vendor in Tehran travels the country, visits book fairs and publishers, even makes copies at the National Library. It’s a relationship that has been built and maintained over three generations. In the case of Cushing Academy, while it may seem they’ve traded a collection of 20,000 books for a database holding 300,000, what they lost are those years of acquisitions, of decisions made by professionals with the best interest of the students in mind.

Even after working in the library for over ten years, I still get a thrill when I tear open the latest packages,  gritty with dust and dirt, often battered and torn, like a message sent from the other side of the world cobbled together from a hundred sources by a single hand for us to share with anyone who cares to drop in. These relationships are what make a library collection unique, and this is what is lost when we get rid of the books.

See?

Why didn’t I think of this before? Courtesy of Tony Mirseyedi’s Tehran High Flying Tumblers:

They're not all white.

A breeding pair

Again with the pigeons

So, more pigeons, this time disguised as doves. This is by a poet named Parvin Etesami, a short-lived but beloved writer of early twentieth-century Iran. She’s one of the few female poets who has gained wide-spread recognition, remarkable considering the tradition-bound era in which she lived. Here’s a Wikipedia article which benefits from a high tolerance for grammatical errors. I can’t vouch for all the facts, being too lazy to double-check: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parvin_E%27tesami . Her poetry is fascinating; classical forms and tropes (particularly moralistic fables) with a modern tinge to it all. I’m no expert but I’m going to be looking into her work further, so I’ll report back. Bahar, about whom I guess I’m now writing a book, thought highly of her.

I’ve chosen to translate kabutar as “dove” in this poem because that particular bird is meant to represent the beautiful and self-absorbed, which clashes with the image of our own humble pigeon. The crow is just the opposite, a bird held in only slightly higher regard than the accursed owl, a portent of doom and misery (no, really).

Maybe next time I’ll tell you about the kabutarkhane, or pigeon-houses. Cool things. I bet you can’t wait.

Disclaimer: this translation is a work in progress. Actually, that applies to most things here.

Parvin Etesami

White and Black

As dawn took flight, a dove

sat on its nest, preening its feathers but flying nowhere.

From afar an arrow, heart-rending, flew and struck its breast,

proof of the rewards of sarcasm.

Wings and feathers shattered, its body weak,

Hope cut off at the root and veins torn open.

At nightfall, a crow passed by the nest

When it saw the dove in agony, the crow became a doctor.

It removed the arrow and built the dove a shelter,

taking great pains to ease the pain of its patient.

The crow struggled mightily until the windows and roof

were covered with green leaves.

It stole water from the brook and carried it in its beak.

The crow made its way to the garden and plucked fruit from the branches.

At times, a father, at times, a mother, and at times, a guardian,

the crow fed the dove, caressed it, and listened to its complaints.

The crow carried this heavy burden until one day

his patient cast off pain and weariness.

The dove said to the crow, “What relation has black with white?

Who has asked you to come to the aid of strangers?”

The crow answered, “Our intentions are one and the same,

There is no difference between the service of black and white.

Within you, as with me, beats a tiny heart,

I, like you, have a body made of sinew and veins.

One must be pure in speech and a true companion;

What matter whether we be friends of old, or just met?

Never approach in ignorance those who suffer ;

In times of need, do not creep off into a corner of the house to hide.

If the goal is to strive to open the lock of happiness,

what matter whether the key is gold or iron?”

A heart-warming tale

How’s about a story? This is taken from the Siyasatname, or “Treatise on the Art of Government” written in the 11th century by the famed prime minister Nizam al-Molk who served the Seljuq dynasty. Does that mean anything to you? Probably not. Well, I love this book because it’s written in a sort of earthy, off-the-cuff language and filled with lots of gory details, particularly when it comes to dealing with your enemies (hint: dig as many holes as you have enemies, it comes in handy later. For the burying alive part). Also, Nizam al-Molk was an interesting guy and apparently really knew his stuff when it came to running a kingdom. Unfortunately, those heretics came back to bite him, an event eerily foretold in the closing passage when he says (more or less) “Now I’m off on a trip to Baghdad, so I’m handing this over to the scribe just in case I don’t make it back alive and he can pass it on to the king.” Well, funny story… remember those heretics? Some of them happened to be followers of Hasan “Old Man of the Mountain” Sabbah, head of the Batini sect of Shi’ism best  known today as the Assassins (hashishan, supposedly because they were were hopped up on hash). And so it goes.

This is from the chapter entitled “On Not Hurrying Through Your Work”:

There was a wise old man who was well-known throughout the city of Herat [...] It happened that the Sultan came to Herat and stayed there for some time. [A man by the name of] ‘Abd al-Rahman Khal was staying at the house of the old scholar. Later, while drinking wine with the Sultan, he said “This old man has a house and can be found there every night. They say that he spends all night in prayer, but I opened his door today and I saw a jug of bitter wine and an idol made of brass.  He spends all night boozing and worshipping his brazen idol.” ‘Abd al-Rahman Khal had brought a jug of wine and an idol with him, knowing that as soon as he had told the Sultan this news, the Sultan would order the old man to be killed that very hour.

So a servant and another man were sent out in search of the old man, but another man came to me and said “Send someone and fetch the wise old man.” I didn’t know what the pupose of these summons was. An hour later, another person came and said “Don’t send anyone to fetch the old man.” The next day, I asked the Sultan “What was that all about last night, with the “Go summon the old man,” “Don’t summon the old man”?

“That was the audacity of  ‘Abd al-Rahman Khal” and he told me the whole story. He said, “I told ‘Abd al-Rahman Khal, “Even though you have told me these things and shown me the bottle of wine and the idol, I will not issue commands which are based on falsehoods. Take my hand and swear on my head and soul whether what you have told is the truth or a lie.” He replied “A lie.” I said “O scoundrel, why would you tell such lies about the old man and wish his death?” He answered, “Because he has a really nice house and I knew you would give it to me once he had been killed.”

Note: After completing this passage, I looked at Hubert Darke’s translation to double-check a few points (which I have chosen to omit as they added nothing to the narrative). I found that we had rendered a few lines in almost identical language. There are only so many words, after all. I made no changes to my translation after looking at Darke’s, so for all of you who thought “Now where have I heard that before?” and reached for your dog-eared copy of The Book of Government, or, Rules for Kings (Hubert Darke. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1960), please refrain from sending indignant letters to the Time Literary Supplement exposing my crimes.  I assure you all is above-board. See Links at right for the Google copy.

Pigeon poem

 I’m going to cheat a little and give you a poem that I translated long ago. It’s hot, after all, and there’s beer in the fridge that could use some drinking. This is by Malek al-Sho’ara Muhammad Taqi Bahar, the poet who exemplifies the trials and tribulations of 20th century Iran in its struggle to adopt constitutional government. “Why, Matt,” I hear you ask, “Isn’t that the same poet about whom you wrote your dissertation?” Indeed it is, thanks for noticing. This poem has nothing to do with nationalism, the context in which he is usually discussed, but it does have a lot to do with pigeons. Pigeon-keeping is an Iranian hobby with ancient roots. Maybe some day I’ll look it up and tell you what those roots are. Iranian pigeons are more like doves than the grey birds we know (apparently, doves and pigeons are pretty much one and the same. Who knew?). I have a very fond memory of watching the rooftop pigeon keepers in Tehran from the window of my highrise hotel room, as a man stood among a flock of birds while two more climbed into the sky, doing a sort of twirling dance, and then came back to rest at his feet.  This is taken from the most recent edition of his divan, v.1, p.365. (eventually, I’ll get around to including Persian text and citations).

 

Come, beloved pigeons,

with your camphor-colored bodies, your vermillion feet,

fly from the roof and all at once

drift down around me like snow.

At dawn, when the golden bird

scatters its feathers from the eastern tower,

I see you display your loveliness,

raising your heads from behind the door’s glass.

Singing your innocent song from on high,

coyly fanning your tails

with the morning breeze, I hear

love-tidings in your cooing.

At dawn, you begin, slowly, calmly,

those delicate celestial songs.

You send a message to those in love

at every moment, with tongues that know no speech.

Prepare yourselves, as do new brides;

I open the door of your nest and

the roar of your wings at that moment

travels from the house into the streets and neighborhoods.

It’s as if the door of highest paradise were opening

when I open that door to you

You fly, quick as angels

up towards Heaven, wings paired as if sewn to one another. 

According to ancient peoples,

angels descend from the heavenly sphere.

But you angels take to the sky from the roof,

soaring to wondrous heights.

From you, under any circumstances,

even if you are left without water and seed,

comes no crying, no clamor

nothing but a loving, fetching song.

Come down, friends, from off your perches,

wing beating wing, dancing about;

come sit quiet on this roof

for there is no one here but me.

Come, loyal friends,

I have scattered seed here for you.

For although the sight of you makes me sorrow,

it is far better than seeing my own kind, below, in the streets.