Poet of the Month 042: FARZANEH KHOJANDI

FARZANEH KHOJANDI
c 2015

FORGOTTEN BY TIME

 

There was a boy.  He would spread his wares
in our alley.  The strength of the hero, Rostam,
roared from his shoulders,
he had the features of a Joseph,
his hair was the torch of Zoroaster,
flaming with ancient times.
The young boy sat on an old stool,
saying goodbye to his rose-scented time.
His sweets had no takers,
sweating in their paper wrappers;
his cheap cigarettes knew
that the point of their lives was to burn;
his soaps longed for the day
they would lather in beautiful hands and die.
The boy turned his eyes
towards passers-by
and, pondering the to and fro of cars,
he didn't think of spring coming and going.
The summer of his youth
was dissolving into sunset
and winter would wrap him in snow.
Happy?  Unhappy?
For he was oblivious to love,
for the margins of his life were rusting,
for he mistook the moon's halo for the moon.
Ruthless life had sat a young boy
on an old stool and forgotten him.

 

 

date unspecified

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Translated by

 

NARGUESS FARZAD 

 

and  

 

JO SHAPCOTT

 

 

 

The following biographical statement appears on the Poetry Translation Center website.  [It is re-posted here for information purposes only and, like the poem re-posted above, remains its author's exclusive copyright-protected intellectual property.]

 

Born in the remote Khojand province of Tajikistan in 1964, Farzaneh Khojandi is widely regarded as the most exciting woman poet writing in Persian (Farsi, Tajik) today and has a huge following in Iran and Afghanistan as well as in Tajikistan, where she is simply regarded as the country's foremost living writer.  Her frequently playful and witty poetry draws on the rich tradition of Persian literature in an often subversive and humorous way.

 

 

 

Use the link below to read more poems by Tajikistani poet FARZANEH KHOJANDI:

 

 

http://www.poetrytranslation.org/poets/farzaneh-khojandi

 

 

 

 

 

 

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