Two Poems

Khorramshahr and Free-for-All Coffins (Without Lids and Bodies)
by Behzad Zarrinpour

When my hand couldn’t reach the bell,

I used to knock on the door.

Now my hand can reach the bell—

but there’s no door left to knock on.

I look back:

A day or two before the recess bell,

the “Children’s Program” had just ended.

As always, we took the ball outside,

when a long, eerie whistle

stopped our game,

silencing the sparrows,

and somewhere, an unborn child dropped to the ground.

The Karun paused for a moment under the bridge,

and we were summoned to a new game—

now, balls would catch fire instead of scoring goals.

Even the sparrows tore down their nests.

We gathered up our kites.

The grown-ups fell silent.

After that,

no one ever laid out a tablecloth under a roof.

I take off my shirt:

the Karun doesn’t recognize me anymore.

Its bitter current

carried swollen bodies

out of memory and into the sea’s forgetfulness—

as if this river brings nothing

but mourning.

I look back:

They pulled the crossed-out school janitor,

from beneath the rubble—

one hand holding a wrinkled map of Iran,

the other a handkerchief

left from local dances and weeping.

And we, with all our trembling fear,

couldn’t help but be happy about school being closed          “Until Further Notice.”

A new calendar was placed on every desk—

every day marked in red:                                                                    “Until Further Notice.”

I go to tend the grief-stricken palm trees;

they ask for rope—

their shoulders burned longing for swings—

even now, every Friday,

they dust off their own shadows.

I look back:

to endure.

The wind fills the city’s lungs

with the scent of ruin.

No one shields themselves from the sun’s reproach

beneath the unsteady kindness of a wall.

Empty promises.

Stomachs are filled not by bread, but by bullets.

And bankrupt salt sellers

who sent their sacks to the front lines

to use as bunker walls.

Terror seized Grandmother’s tongue—

she could no longer say her forgotten prayers.

Those just a little older than us

picked up rifles and simple hopes,

and for our faded colors and lost dreams

marched all the way to the border of rain and madness—

and after a few bullets,

they left, carried out in broken lines of mourning.

And we, with no rhyme left to lose,

invented our own free verse laments.

While Mother locked the door,

Father opened the birdcage.

But the collared dove

flew by the trees, unconcerned…

This was the beginning of our exile

and the rationing of the moon,

the long, restless nights

beneath tents too small

for all the displaced dreams we carried.

In those early days,

everyone set up their tents and prayers, half-heartedly.

Wherever they went,

they took their house keys with them—

forgetting no one poured water after us

when we left the city alone.

All these years,

my heart became hard as iron—

nothing could take it from me

except my childhood neighborhood.

But now, how could I

run with my head in the clouds

through alleyways laid with mines?

How could I mischievously leap

over the fire

meant only for burning, not for play?

How many excuses I invent!

I, who for so many years

dreamed in poverty and humility,

never letting anyone

hold a single coin against my name.

All I want

is to save my pocket change for a piggy bank—

but this time, to fill it with bullets and wheat.

This time…

The voice of the wind arrives—

I feel it loaded with unspoken words.

I wet my finger

and, aimless, follow the wind…

Clocks forever lagging behind.

Recess bells rusting in the playground.

Fences torn away.

Dud seeds.

Palms in distress.

Dolls dressed in identical military uniforms.

Bank accounts running with blood.

Free-for-all coffins without lids and bodies.

Wingless gables.

Drainpipes blocked at the breaking point,

still promising the alley some chance of rain.

Windows left open.

Walls crumbled.

And alleyways so crushed

they no longer dream of rising—

as if they had never known the light.

O beautiful, mud-laden Karun,

tell your wave-tossed fish

to come keep company

with the grieving boats at your shore.

The fossils of broken dances

are never carried

out from under the fallen bridge

into any museum.