Translation by Dick Davis

English translation directly from the Persian by Dick Davis

My back aches
Three months ago they moved my heart
They put it in my spine
Next to the thirteenth vertebra
Now my life depends on a thin vein that empties blood from that dark
pit into my new heart
My idiotic bruise of a vein!
My wanton whore of a heart!
These days I get my news from my ECG
The headlines are about the past
About a woman who used to laugh
About a man I loved once
About tapped telephones
And lavishly healthy hearts.
The heart is a window
Facing one exile after another
This bunched red muscle
I wish it were a mirror, facing Now.

The medical team, with a friendly smile: ‘We had to move it a bit;
From today on, set your watch by your heart!’
The rotted alarm clocks . . .
Last night my new lover asked, ‘Do you think we’re being watched?’
I thought he was quizzing me to see how crazy and paranoid I am
I hid my willful shadows from him
For years I’ve hidden my shadows’ eyes in my dresses
From one city to another
The last shadow was running with a bloody heart in his fist.
Doctors are the enemies of shadows
And experts in diagnosing paranoia.
They know very well what to prescribe for exile:
Moving the heart
In times when no scar of any heart
Will heal.