At a time when literature and
the arts, and just about everything else in Iran were dominated by men, when
very few women were respected as poets, a young woman by the name of Forugh
Farrokhzad (1935-1967) began writing and publishing poems that radiated with
sensuality, pushing the boundaries of what could be uttered or put on paper by
women.
Historically, women—their
beautiful breasts, hair, eyes, etc.—have been the subjects of a great number of
Iranian poems, both modern and ancient, but when Forugh broke into Iran’s
poetry scene in 1954, she made men her poetic subjects, her objects
of love and reverie, of passion and sexual desire. Her poems were
autobiographical and from a clearly feminine perspective. Further, they were
“modern” as opposed to “traditional,” a form rejected by Iran’s academic
community at the time and not considered poetry at all.
The most scandalous of her
early poems was Sin, first published in a magazine and later included in
her second collection of poems, Deevar (The wall).
Sin
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.
(From Sin: Selected Poems of
Forugh Farrokhazd, translated by Sholeh Wolpé)
In this poem, Forugh not only
celebrates committing a carnal sin, but in the hearts of many commits an even
greater transgression by so unabashedly expressing an intimately feminine point
of view. However, at this point, not
even the intellectuals grasp the taboo-breaking, empowering effects of Forugh’s
“Sin” on Iran, and particularly on Iran’s future generations of women.
Here are a few samplings of
her early work:
Like the disheveled locks
of a woman
the Karun river spreads
itself
on the naked shoulders of
the shore
(from
Grief, translation Sholeh Wolpé)
I’m so filled with you
I want to run through
meadows,
bash my head against
mountain rocks,
give myself to ocean waves
( from On Loving, translation Sholeh Wolpé)
Silent and soaring, I
closed my eyes,
pressed my body against
the soft young rushes,
and like a woman folded
into her lover’s arms
gave myself to the flowing
waters
(from Bathing, translation Sholeh Wolpé)
The stress of divorce,
separation from her son, and the societal criticism of her mores, in addition
to her own family’s rejection, were too much for the young poet to endure. At
the age of twenty she had a nervous breakdown. Still, she refused to be viewed
as a tragic figure. She was dedicated to poetry; it was woven to the fabric of
her soul:
I believe to be a poet is
a life-long endeavor. To be a poet is to be a human being. I know people whose
poetry is not a reflection of their daily life. That is, they are only poets
when they are in the process of writing their poems. When they put their pen
down they revert to their hoarding, gluttonous, narrow minded, greedy selves.
Well, how can I accept what they say? I value life more than that. When these
gentlemen make fists and begin their harangues – in their poems and articles –
I feel a kind of aversion towards them, unable to believe that anything they
say can possibly be true. I keep wondering, are they howling like that just to
earn a day’s plate of basmati rice?
By 1958, Forugh was 23 years
old and had three collections of poems in print. She had a meteoric rise into
fame and despite her being one of the major pioneers of modernist poetry in
Iran, she was still being called a “poetess” as opposed to a more respectful
“poet.”
In the fall of 1962 she
traveled with four colleagues to leprosarium in the city of Tabriz and, in the
course of twelve days, filmed The House is Black, a documentary about a
forgotten people. The artistic merit and success of the film cast Forugh in a
different light; she was seen as a serious film director. Many intellectuals
viewed the film as a statement about the decaying state of their own society,
where all cures for the body politic were sought through faith and prayers
rather than through rational discourse. Within a year, the film won the
prestigious Best Documentary Award in the 1963 Oberhausen Film Festival in
Germany.
When Forugh’s fourth
collection of poems, Reborn, appeared in 1964, it was immediately hailed
as a major work rivaling the best in the short history of Persian modernist poetry.
Finally, in the eyes of the literati and the media she had moved from being a
good “poetess” to a great “poet.” Her poems are carefully and widely read, discussed
and analyzed. Her work had finally reached a level of maturity in both content
and form that could not be dismissed.
From the summer of 1964
through December 1966, Forugh published five poems, each more discerning and
inventive than anything she had previously written. These were more political
than her previous poems, scrutinizing the social injustice under the Shah’s
rule, the modern Tehran with its increasingly mechanized way of life, and the
hopelessness of those struggling to make a living.
She began her poem “Earthly Verses” with these lines:
Then,
the sun grew cold
and the earth became barren.
The grass withered in the
meadows
and the fish withered in the
sea
and the earth no longer
welcomed the dead.
The night, like a strange
specter
gathered and swelled in the
pallid windows,
and the roads released
themselves
into the dark.
No one dreamed of love
anymore.
No one dreamed of beginnings.
No one dreamed of anything
anymore.
(from
Reborn, translation Sholeh Wolpé)
On Feb. 14, 1967 Forugh was
on her way to the movie studios, where she worked. She swerved her jeep to miss an oncoming
school vehicle and was thrown from the car. Her head hit the cement gutter and
she died instantly. She was thirty-two years old.
P.S. I spent two years translating 41 of Forugh
Farrokhzad’s poems. As a woman and a poet it was important to me to bring her
poetry to life in English as living poems rather than sad corpses that only
transmit information. Some say translation
is a thankless job. It depends. If one is after fame or financial gain, that
statement is true. But if one translates for the sake of love: love of poetry, love
of readers, and of bringing cultures and people closer to one another, literary
translation is a most rewarding work in the world.
In tomorrow’s blog, I will
post two or three of this remarkable poet’s poems.