By Farzaneh Khojandi
Translated by Jo Shapcott
In this leafy orchard is a nightingale,
a nightingale whose songs are the dawn
and take me into the light,
to the mountains of legendary Farhad,
and to the place where mad Majnun talks to the raven:
'Hello gorgeous!' And to that lucky cave,
luminous with solitude, basking in gold,
and to a paradise where Adam and Eve stare at a wheat grain:
'Shall we taste it or not?' If I were Eve, I wouldn't taste it.
Thank goodness I'm not Eve or else mankind
would never forgive me for not sinning.
O tiny, miraculous wheat grain, O tiny apple of amazement,
O simple beginnings of myself.
There is a nightingale who sings my see through thoughts,
sings back to the beginning of memory.
There is a nightingale flying out of the cage of my breast;
it's chirping now at the edge of morning.
I am leaving; I am leaving, my friend.
You have to step into life, spread your existence,
you must hurry,
you must bring to Farhad in the story,
the good news about Shirin, his beloved,
you must enter Zoroaster's cave
and taste the light.
To taste the wheat grain of paradise - or not? O...
I am leaving, I am leaving at last:
my friend, open your heart for me.
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I had a fairly quiet Friday. Daniel, who apparently stayed up at least till 3:30 a.m., slept very late, so I spent the morning working on a review of Deep Space Nine's "The Alternate", not one of the best but it's an Odo backstory episode which makes it worth watching. When he finally got up, Daniel decided he wanted a Haagen Dazs milkshake, so I took him to the mall and went to admire the new Brighton nautical charms (why yes, I do have the while he was having his Belgian chocolate.
We had dinner with my parents, then Adam went to sleep at a friend's and the rest of us watched the Nikita season finale, which had about eleven shark-jumping moments but I have never cared about the plot on this show anyway; there are three completely awesome kick-ass women who are regulars and now there's a female VP of the US too. After that we watched the last four episodes of DS9's sixth season, which are mostly sad episodes but really terrific. Here are some photos from Great Falls last weekend -- mules, turtles, a millipede, and a few more goslings:
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