2 Poems

one day I was watching   a rabbit eating grass

on the verge across the way   when a young

stranger came creeping   speaking

softly to the rabbit   she scooped it up in her

arms and disappeared   behind a gate

I sipped my tea   and waited

she reappeared   stooped and pulled

great handfuls of grass   and away she went

back behind the gate   her hands still

stained with green   as she left she paused

wiping a hand on her jeans   she looked up at me

what passed between us then   I really couldn’t say

Women’s Ward, Evin Prison, Tehran

we kneel on blanket carpets and chop cucumber for the salad

camphor bread on the side     the walls are plain     the mattress thin

we watch sparrows through the gap in the ceiling     we sway around the yard

in the daylight     arm in arm     chatting over the washing     drying our hair     sometimes

there’s a ball beside the pomegranate tree     sometimes there’s a

brawl beside the pomegranate tree     we do not hate our captors     we watch

No One Knows About Persian Cats on the TV

we pin nasturtium leaves to the cell door     messages of welcome penned

across them     we don blindfolds at night to shut out the fluorescent light

and the voices of the inquisitors return     they ask the name of the first

street I lived on     they always stand behind me     they ask the name of the

woman who sold me love cakes on the corner     I do not know how many

stand behind me     they ask the name of my daughter’s first schoolteacher

I sit at a school desk with them behind me     they ask they ask they ask

they do not care they ask     life is currency in Evin     spare it if we can

spend it if we cannot     but we dissolve in fits of laughter when

Roxana tells us she asked her interrogator for a bra

once in the heart of winter     a woman called out to us

in greeting     her words drifting     from some faraway season

when I was little     she mused     we sent messages by nasturtium leaf

duck-running across the garden     to deliver them     and running just as fast

back     sometimes we sucked honey from the flowers     sometimes we

tucked daisy chains into the leaves     if we basked in the pōhutukawa

we could see each other from the top branches     eating grapefruits

just to prove we liked them     spitting the seeds to the ground

we huddled under the gap in the ceiling     seeds of

memory blooming bittersweet     between us

the Caspian sea stretching     endlessly     emerald tunnels

and ferns underfoot     verjus dribbling on chins     sky

dreams under     hazy heat     an orange ball     a distant cry     attar

of roses     on the breeze     you see     she said then

turning to me     your voice sparks voice in me

Note –

Evin is a prison in Tehran, Iran. The prison ward descriptions are largely drawn from Roxana Saberi’s memoir, Between Two Worlds: My Life and Captivity in Iran (HarperCollins, 2011). “once in the heart of winter     a woman called out to us in greeting” is adapted from a line in Mahvash Sabet’s poem, “And This is Where I Stand Sometimes,” in Prison Poems, adapted by Bahiyyih Nakhjavani (George Ronald, 2013), p. 17.