Everything is Simple

In Night’s Cold Streets

by فروغ فرخزاد Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967)
(translated by شعله ولپی Sholeh Wolpé)

I don’t repent,
thinking of this resignation, this pained surrender.
I’ve kissed my life’s cross
on the hills of my execution.

In night’s cold streets
couples always part
hesitantly.
In night’s cold streets
there are no sounds, just voices
calling Goodbye, goodbye.

I don’t repent.
It’s as if my heart flows
on the other side of time.
Life will echo my heart,
and the dandelion seeds sailing
the wind’s lakes will re-create me.

Do you see how my skin
is cracking wide?
How milk forms
in my breast’s cold blue veins?
How blood begins to form sinew
in my patient loins?

I am you, you,
and one who loves,
one who suddenly finds herself
a dumb grafting to a thousand strange unknowns.
I’m the earth’s ferocious lust
sucking all the waters in
to impregnate the fields.

Listen to my distant voice
in the heavy mist of dawn’s prayer chants,
and in silent mirrors see how
with what is left of my hands
I touch, once more, all dreams’ innermost dark,
and imprint my heart like a bloodstain
on life’s innocent riches.

I don’t repent.
Darling, speak to me
of another me
with the same lovesick eyes
whom you’ll find again in the cold streets of night.
And think of me in her sad kiss
on the sweet lines beneath your eyes. 

Grief

by فروغ فرخزاد Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967)
(translated by شعله ولپی Sholeh Wolpé)

Like the disheveled locks of a woman
the Karun river spreads itself
on the naked shoulders of the shore.
The sun is gone, and the night’s hot breath
wafts over the water’s beating heart.

Far in the distance the river’s southern shore
is love-drunk in moonlight’s embrace.
The night with its million brilliant bloodshot eyes
spies on beds of innocent lovers.

The cane field is fast asleep. A bird
shrieks from amid its darkness,
and the moonbeams rush to see
what fear has driven it to such despair.

On the river’s skin, palm shadows
tremble at the sensual touch of the breeze,
and inside the silent secret deep of night,
frogs sing their loud frog songs.

In this rapturous night’s bliss
the distant dream of your hands draw near,
your scent rushes in like a wave, your eyes
glimmer on the water’s face, then go dark.

My pitiful heart, eager and hopeful,
fell captive to the hands of your love.
You sailed away on your own river, left this land—
O snapped branch of my passion’s storm. 

Sin

by فروغ فرخزاد Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967)
(translated by شعله ولپی Sholeh Wolpé)

I have sinned a rapturous sin
in a warm enflamed embrace,
sinned in a pair of vindictive arms,
arms violent and ablaze.

In that quiet vacant dark
I looked into his mystic eyes,
found such longing that my heart
fluttered impatient in my breast. 

In that quiet vacant dark
I sat beside him punch-drunk,
his lips released desire on mine,
grief unclenched my crazy heart.

I poured in his ears lyrics of love:
O my life, my lover it’s you I want.
Life-giving arms, it’s you I crave.
Crazed lover, for you I thirst. 

Lust enflamed his eyes,
red wine trembled in the cup,
my body, naked and drunk,
quivered softly on his breast.

I have sinned a rapturous sin
beside a body quivering and spent.
I do not know what I did O God,
in that quiet vacant dark.

The Wind Will Take Us Away

by Forough Farrokhzad (1935-1967)
(translated by Hasan Javadi & Susan Sallée)

In my small night, alas
the wind has a date with the leaves of the trees
In my small night there is fear of ruin

Listen
Do you hear the howl of the darkness?
I, like a stranger, look at this good fortune,
addicted to my own despair.
Listen
Do you hear the howl of the darkness?

Something now is passing in the night
The moon is crimson and perturbed
Above this roof, which moment by moment embraces the fear of falling,
clouds appear, like a mourning throng,
to await the moment of rain.

A moment,
then nothing.
Behind this window the night is trembling
and the earth is slackening
its rotation
Behind this window one unknown
is anxiously awaiting you and I.

O you, verdant from head to toe
Put your hands like a burning memory in my loving embrace,
and entrust your lips aglow from life
to my enamoured lips’ caresses
The wind will take us away
The wind will take us away