Duet

Move through the past,
through the legends, beyond the history,
through the poetry, through the old stories,
beyond the gates of Sheba, beyond
Solomon and the fabled talking bird
to where I hear your voice,
distant, far across the Sea of Despair,
pleading with the Gods and the Fates:

I am searching and searching to find
constant reminders of-to where do I belong . . .

I listen quietly although I can never truly know
the depths of these passions that drive you
along the paths of quiet desperation.
My exiles are those of my own choosing.

Why do I not understand the language they speak,
the ideology they believe, and the life they live?

Their belief is covered with thick black ice
and I'm a tiny little one, melting away . . .

There is a distant stream that flows from the mountains,
through the uncharted wilderness, and grows in strength
and power as it moves homeward to the sea. Along the way
it encounters the stone cruelty of the rocks that in the end
ebb in defeat over generations to the inevitability of the water.

They have enslaved me
with the direct connection to their God/s,
with the enslavement of my dreams,
with the exile of my hope.

And they make me feel ugly to my bones . . .

The rose stands alone cold in the garden before
the withering frost. It must be patient and await
the gentle fingers of spring where true beauty lies
when it blossoms burst forth in a splendor that cannot be denied.

To them I am a whore
walking on the streets of my life,
condemned to the Babylon of their wrath . . .

Within you lies the true strength of woman,
the ability to create, the ability to nurture,
the ability to withstand the torrents of oppression,
for you think in generations and not in moments.

Within your words are the sky and the wind
and the mountains and the trees and the dreams
where others will realize that such hatred
can only consume if one allows it to do so.

That is why they fear you.

They have their Iran,
I have mine . . .

Sheema Kalbasi and Roger Humes