Iranian and Palestinian Poets Unite to Condemn Gaza Attacks

TARNA.IR-TEHRAN:In a ceremony held in Washington D.C., Iranian and Palestinian poets read a joint statement condemning the massacre of civilians in Gaza.

a message by Alireza Bahrami, poet and editor of the cultural-art magazine Asr-e Roshan, was endorsed by several international literary figures in protest against the killings of Iranian poet Parnia Abbasi, and Palestinian poets Hiba Abunda and Rifaat Al-Aryar during Israeli attacks in Tehran and Gaza.

The message and statement were read in English by Palestinian poet Samar Najia during an event on Sunday night at the Senkofa Book Café in Washington D.C. The program featured a bilingual poetry performance by Iranian poet Sepideh Jadidi and Samar Najia, aiming to strengthen bonds between Iranian and Palestinian poets.

Bahrami sent a dedicated message from Tehran that was read by Sepideh Jadidi along with other poets present. Senkofa Book Café, a well-known cultural hub in Washington D.C., has hosted programs over the decades focused on anti-colonial struggles and solidarity with Palestine.

Sepideh Jadidi, an Iranian poet and journalist residing in the U.S., emphasized that she has been fully engaged in supporting the Palestinian people in recent months.

Joint Statement by Alireza Bahrami (Unedited):

Dear Samar
Dear Sepideh
I am writing this letter to you from Tehran. The nights in Tehran are quiet again. My family is sleeping soundly in their beds and there is no sound of air defense or explosion.
But I am ashamed of this quiet life.
A few weeks ago, on a warm Friday morning in spring, we left home, a few hours after the first Israeli airstrike on Iran. My son had an entrance exam for high school. The exam had been canceled because of the outbreak of war. They were not taking the exam for an unknown future.

That day, we had to go to the cemetery to attend a family ceremony. Cemeteries do not close during war. Between the canceled exam and the cemetery that was not canceled, we went to a cafe; the kind you go to once, because you pass that street once. People in the cafe were talking about the attack the night before. There seemed to be something unusual, but I did not understand what. When, a few hours later, I found out that two blocks above that cafe, the shattered head of a young poet, a 24-year-old girl, had been shattered between the cement blocks, I was ashamed; for the coffee I drank and the egg I ate, in that cafe, on that street.
Parniya Abbasi had been killed in her bed. Her sheets were pink and her blood was red. That night, Parnia’s 15-year-old brother and parents were also killed. They had just moved into this house. They loved this house, for the trees around it and the birds.
Now the birds are still singing on the branches of those trees. I wonder if the birds are as ashamed as I am?

But I have a guilty conscience because of that breakfast.
Every night when I open the refrigerator door to drink water, I am ashamed. When I water the plants in the garden, I am ashamed; When I read in the news every day that children in Gaza are dying of hunger and thirst.
Today I read in the newspaper that a Palestinian teenage boy was killed when a food box fell on his head when the parachute of a plane failed to open. I remembered that a few days ago I bought my teenage son an instrument. So I felt ashamed.

We take refuge in humanity to escape this torment of conscience. We do everything we can to express sympathy. Solidarity. We share the pain and each of us takes a big piece or we take it to the university, the office, the cafe and home ourselves.
Each of us is a lighthouse, in the middle of the city! So that darkness does not fall on the world.
From Tehran, I shake your hand firmly and bow. You are extraordinary people who struggle every day to keep the lighthouses lit so that the ship of humanity does not hit the rocks and drown.

Alireza Bahrami
Tehran

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