Silent Suffering

Translated from Persian to English by Saba Vasefi

Like a wounded tree
that burned
in the fire of the Island’s feverish forests
and the only cure for its blisters
are dark clouds,
I have fallen in love with the rain
which has reduced the probability
of burning my 25-year-old
leaves below zero
and swallowing prison moulds.

For the wind,
for human rights,
for politics,
there is no trust —
Wherever the tongueless fire explodes
and silent suffering sits in its ashes
they arrive to give aid:
not to save lives,
but to facilitate deaths.

Just like the wind
that blows the fire
fiercer and faster
they are twisting around
the throat of my displacement
to announce the destruction
of this bruised and lifeless soul.

Life is a strange incident;
but the life of an outcast is an even
more horrible hospital
prescribing Cyanide
to its injured patients,
and its nurses are rugged men
who ruthlessly steal the pillow
of peace from under our heads.

Where everything is wild
even light is a prisoner,
and justice commits suicide every day.

But here
you can only fall in love with the rain
which keeps life crisp and delicate.
So long live the rain
that gives life to my leaves
so that my poems may take root again.